The colour of death
by abirdonalilactree13
Summary: A strange person starts to follow Barnaby around. Then Sykes discovers something horrifying. Some people go missing, some people die. Things happen. Disclaimer: I don't own Midsomer Murders.
1. chapter 1

Sadly I don't own it, it's just written for fun and completely unbetaed.

Without further ado: Enjoy!

Chapter 1

Grey mixed with red sprinkles mixed with black, to become grey once more.

It was raining.

Not like if the angels were crying, but as if all hell was breaking lose.

Water was washing away the bloodstains on his clothes, floating away in that huge puddle, surrounding him.

Most, what could have been used as evidence was washed away, soaked up by the thirsty ground. There were no more footprints to be seen or any other hint, that someone has been with him, the moment he took his last breath.

Then there was thunder and after that a lightning bolt, that hit the tree next to him. The tree broke down, burning.

And the corpse was buried underneath it.

Despite the raging rain, the tree kept burning, and red flames fought against grey rain, erasing almost every remains of Walter Falk from earth.

~~~M~~~

Detective Chief Inspector John Barnaby was on his way to the local pub, when the first drops of rain had almost silently hit the ground.

When the weather had shown its worst side, Barnaby was still waiting in the pub for his Sergeant, Ben Jones, to meet him.

He sighed, as he stared into his beer, thoughtfully.

"Erm... excuse me, Sir, but is this seat taken?", a shy voice suddenly reminded him of where he was.

"Not yet. Please, do have a seat.", he said, before he looked up and stared into a face, that was half hidden behind sunglasses.

The young man stared back.

"O.M.G. Are you really, who I think you are?", he asked in a high-pitched voice.

" _Who_ do you think I am?", Barnaby asked, already searching an excuse to leave the pub.

"You are DCI John Barnaby from Causton CID! Am I right?"

"I'm sorry, but do I know you?"

"Nah. Probably not.", the young man said, as he looked him up and down. "Oh! How rude of me! I am Elyas Sanchez."

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Sanchez. So where do you know me from?" When he got a closer look on the person in front of him, he noticed, that his hair was dyed in a pale blond.

They shook hands and the younger man nodded excitedly. "I've read a few articles about you in the newspapers. You did some quite _impressive_ things, Mr. Barnaby. So I went to search for you and now I found you!" Elyas said, beaming brightly.

Barnaby had thought about escaping, but the young man, despite his strange outward appearance, seemed to be surprisingly harmless. And just now, Barnaby got interested in the conversation.

"So you are a fan of mine? I feel honoured. Why did you want to find me? Are you in trouble?", he asked.

"Oh! Nononoho! I'm a Blogger. I sometimes write about interesting people. And you are very interesting, Mr. Barnaby.", he whispered excitedly.

"Well, thank you. But why are you wearing sunglasses at this dark and dusty place, if you aren't hiding something?", he asked sceptical.

"Oh. I _am_ hiding something. It's because I'm famous. I don't want anyone to disturb us, by asking for a selfie or an autograph. Which people often do, when they see me."

His voice sounded selfcontious. Barnaby found it hilarious how the man looked so out of place in this room and no one seemed to notice.

So he smiled mildy. "You are an interesting young man, Elyas. What can I help you with?", Barnaby asked, and just after the words had left his mouth, he wondered, why he was still talking to that strange little person.

"It would be just wonderful, if you'd allow me to interview you!", he answered, moving closer to him. Elyas took his glasses down and looked at him with big brown puppy-eyes. "Please?"

Suddenly Barnaby felt a familiar hand on his shoulder from behind. "Sir, I'm so sorry, that I am late. Parts of the streets are flooded." Jones grabbed an empty chair that stood at another table, without asking, and sat next to the DCI.

Water dripped from his hair as he searched for a tissue in his pockets.

"So you must be DS Benjamin Jones! How nice to meet you!"

Ben just then noticed the person sitting across the table. "Hey! You are that guy from the internet! My exgirlfriend Jessica was obsessed with your blog.", Jones said.

"There you have it, Mr Barnaby. I am famous.", Elyas said, gesturing in Bens direction. He put his sunglasses back on.

"Yes, I see. But I am affraid, I have to disappoint you, Elyas. I know how this works. And I'm not a huge fan of interviews and someone twisting every word I say to my disadvantage. I have to decline your offer."

The young blogger looked dramatically shocked "But-"

"I would do an interview.", Ben said and raised his hand like a bored schoolboy.

The other men stared at him and he just shrugged. "Jessica has to see, what she is missing."

Barnaby shook his head. "You are still not over her? Jones, she is getting married."

"She's marrying someone else, because I spend all my time with you, instead of her."

"You spend time with me, because I need your help with all those cases."

"And who's fault is that?"

"Society, Jones."

"It's like you never do anything without my help. In every dangerous situation you send in me first."

"I'm sorry. I didn't know you were that upset with me."

"Well, I am."

After a minute of silence, Barnaby sighed and said: "But you do know, that I secretely really apreciate you."

Jones shrugged and looked down. "Maybe."

"Well, I do. And I sincerely hope, that you do not just see me as a boss, who only utilises you."

"No, you are more than that."

Then Elyas couldn't hold himself back anymore: "Uhhhh! You are sooo cute together. Would you allow me to write about that little conversation of yours? My readers would totaly love it."

"Yes.", Jones said.

"No!", Barnaby said.

"Pretty, pretty please?", Elyas asked.

"No and it's about time, we should leave.", Barnaby said, looking at the clock on the wall, "We have to get up early tomorrow. Maybe I have to send Jones to kick in some doors and get him into dangerous situations, so I can watch him from a safe distance." He got up.

"I'm sorry, I said that, Sir."

"Let's just go home. The rain is gone. It was nice to meet you, Elyas and I have to apologise, that we can't help you." He walked a few steps, then turned around once more. "-And don't you dare publish our conversation."

Elyas nodded and watched Barnaby and Jones leave together. He waited for a little while and then he followed them.

~~~M~~~

"Sir, he is following us. Isn't he?", Ben whispered, walking closer to Barnaby.

"I know, Jones.", the DCI whispered back.

They walked a little faster through the dark streets.

"I would really like to do something silly, just to irritate him."

"What do you have in mind, Jones?"

He giggled, stepped closer and answered as quietly as he could: "What about acting like we got an important call to a crime scene? You say, that it's somewhere on the other end of midsomer. He would probably drive there to write his blog about it. But we go somewhere else to have dinner together. Maybe Chinese? Then we go home and act like nothing happened.", Ben whispered in between chuckles.

"Sounds like a plan." Barnaby nodded.

Jones put his hand into his pocket without ostentation and dialed Barnabys number, while looking to the sky.

The phone beeped.

"Hello? ... What? ... there was a murder?...", Barnaby said loudly.

~~~M~~~

Later that evening, Elyas was back at his house, after a long drive to the middle of nowhere and back.

"So, did you find out anything interesting?", a woman in a violet jogging suit asked. It was that kind of clothing you wear, when you sit on the couch all day long.

"Of course I did.", Elyas answered in a bored tone and played with his mobile phone. He sat on the breakfast table, in the small cottage, he had rented for the length of their stay in Causton.

"Will you tell me?", the woman asked, as she looked out of one of the windows, before she closed it. She flicked her brown hair out of her eyes, which looked like she hadn't washed it in days.

If you didn't know, you wouldn't recognize them as brother and sister.

"You'll see, when everyone else sees, Honey." He sighed, like they had had this conversation a thousand times before.

"Stupid little brother.", the woman muttered, as she went over to the table and opened another bottle of wine.

"I heard that, Aud, you fat cow.", Elyas said.

"Just shut up. What did you do with your hair? You look like a Chihuahua with diarrhea.", Audrey told him.

A moment of stairing, then they laughed.

Elyas climbed down from the table. "Honey, I go to sleep, before Grace and Claudia come back. I don't have the nerve to listen to them complaining about Jeffrey again. Good night.", he said and gave her a hug.

"Sure. I'll go hide myself as well. Don't let the bedbugs bite, sweetheart.", she said and went to her bedroom quickly, as she heard the voices of their roommates from outside.

Jones got a small stomachache, after they had eaten a whole lot of chinese food in front of the TV.

Because of that, he had no problem with joining Barnaby for a walk with Sykes.

"Do you feel better, Jones?", Barnaby asked after a while.

"I'm fine, now. Thank you, Sir. I just had a little too much. Going for a walk always makes me feel better after that."

"Do I have to take care of you the next time when we eat together, so you don't get sick, like a small child?"

"Well, you screwed up this time, taking care of me. Didn't you?", Jones chuckled.

"I'm just saying, that even the dog knew when to stop."

"You don't know, if the dog's stomach hurts. He couldn't tell you."

"He tells me everything. ...Hey! Sykes, stop that!", Barnaby said, as the dog barked at a burnt tree about ten metres into the field next to them.

"Bad boy! Stop it! Come back -NOW!", Barnaby yelled, while the dog barked more angrily, running around the wet grey ashes of the tree and whatever laid underneath it.

"HEY! STOP IT!"

Sykes stopped and came back, looking at them with his big dog-eyes, like he wanted to tell them something important.

"No treats for you before bedtime.", Barnaby scolded.

"Are you still telling me, that the dog is smarter than me, Sir?", Jones asked, smiling.

The DCI shrugged and they walked a bit faster towards home, because they suddenly started to feel cold.

~~~M~~~

 **Author's note:**

Feel free to tell me, what you think.

And have a nice day/night! :)


	2. chapter 2

Barnaby and Jones were sitting in their office and doing some paperwork, when exactly nothing happened. They were bored, because there hasn't been a new case in almost two days.

"Sir, do you know, where the paperclips are?"

"You have them."

"No, I don't."

"I know that you always secretely borrow them from me."

"No, I don't.", Jones emphasized, as he walked around his desk.

"Of course you do. You have all of mine."

"No, I don't."

"Yes, you do."

"Therefore you have three staplers."

"No, I don't. Don't be ridiculous."

"I know, that they are in your drawer. What do you even need them for?", Jones asked.

Barnaby didn't answer, because he saw someone entering their office.

"I'll just go and ask Jenkins. -Hello, how can I help you?", Jones asked, as Elyas suddenly stood in front of him.

He was a little shocked at the sight of the young man in a red jacket over a colourful shirt with huge letters F, U and C visible, under a white scarf.

"I'm affraid, I haven't changed my mind about the interview.", Barnaby said, smiling apologetically.

"That's so sad to hear. But actually I'm here to report to you, that my dear friend Walter Falk went missing two days ago.", Elyas said and put his sunglasses down.

"Do you know, that you will get into serious problems, if that's some kind of joke?", Jones asked, crossing his arms.

"Of course I do! I swear, I'm not here to waste your time! Walter Falk is my sister's boyfriend. He came with us and a few other friends on our trip here. We didn't see him since two days ago. Everyone of us thought, that he was with someone else of us.

Today we realised, that he is gone. All his things are still in his room and he didn't have a fight with any of us. And I don't think, that he knows anyone here. So we wonder, if something terrible has happened to him. Could you please help us finding him?", Elyas said.

The detectives hesitated.

"How do we know, that you aren't lying?", Jones asked.

"You have to trust me." Elyas said dramatically, "No blog-stuff, I promise."

Barnaby and Jones looked at each other, then they nodded slowly.

"Fine. What else can you tell us about that-"

"Walter Falk."

"Yes, go on, please."

"He is quite tall. Much taller than me. Brown hair, brown eyes, beautiful smile. He was a pleasant person. Very quiet. ...He might be wearing a blue shirt. He loves blue shirts. ... What else can I say...", he said more to himself, than to the detectives.

Jones looked up from the notes, he had made. "When exactly, where and with whom was he seen last?", he asked.

"That would be two days ago in the morning. We were having breakfast together. My friends and I often eat together. After that, he wanted to go for a walk, before meeting some of us in the town. He left at about ten o'clock."

Barnaby nodded absently and asked: "Who did he want to meet?"

"Jeffrey and Claudia. But he never got there. They thought, he had changed his mind, which is typical for him. And he doesn't answer his phone, which also is typical for him."

"What are the full names of everyone living at your cottage?"

"There are Walter Falk and my sister Audrey Sanchez and there are Grace Myers, Jeffrey Gardner and Claudia Morston. I took them with me as a 'thank you' for all the times they motivated and helped me to write that blog."

"Do you have a photo?"

"Of course. Lots of them." He took his phone and handed it over.

The DCI and the Sergeant exchanged another look. Barnaby nodded slowly and Jones sighed. "Fine. We'll take care of that case."

"Thank you.", Elyas said, smiling brightly.

"You are welcome."

Barnaby gestured politely towards the door, but the young man stood still, where he was and looked at the detectives excitedly.

"...Perhaps... Maybe ...Could I help you with something, Mr. Barnaby? Your work is soooo interesting! I could make some notes, while we-"

"We need you to be at your residence and wait for phonecalls by possible kidnappers. That would be of great help, thank you."

Looking terribly disappointed, Elyas left Causton CID.

~~M~~~.

"Did you seriously go to the police?", Audrey yelled, as Elyas entered the living room.

"Of course I did, Honey.", he said in a rather relaxed tone.

"What, if it's just another one of his idiot ideas?", she hissed, "What, if he really managed to bring them to an end?"

They stared at each other, now angrily.

"That detectives will find him. Dead or alive. I promise, my dear. They are the best here. I've seen the statistics"

"I've seen the statistics, too. And I'm sure, that they are faked. How could there possibly be so many murders in such a small rural area?"

"Maybe there is something in the drinking water.", Elyas said and shrugged. "All I know is, that I will write that blog, because I have put my mind on it and whenever I do that,-"

"But not about that idiot, making himself a fool! Don't write about him!"

"I'll always do, what is necessary. And you know that."

Audrey just grumbled something unfriendly while storming out of the room.

"You know that!", Elyas yelled after her again.

'Whatever', he said to himself, sat down comfortably, opened his Laptop and started to write down his thoughts for that day. Then his finger was about to hit the 'publish'-button. He stopped. No, he would do this differently.

"TBC" was everything he let them know.

Elyas decided with a grin, that he would publish different works for a while, so his readers would know, that something big was coming.

~~M~~~.

After a few phonecalls, Jones said: "No Walter Falk at the hospitals, Sir. And no unidentified new corpses since thursday. Maybe it was some kind of prank after all. Maybe he is hiding somewhere and..."

"Yes, maybe. But there could also be an innocent man in danger. ...And there aren't any new cases? No shootings, no poisonings, today?"

Jones shook his head and sighed.

"I guess it's time to talk to Elyas and his friends then, right?"

~~M~~~

Soon after that conversation, they all were crowded together in the living room of the cottage.

Barnaby waited until everyone was looking at him, then he said: "We are Detective Chief Inspector John Barnaby and Detective Sergeant Ben Jones from Causton CID. We are here to investigate the disappearence of Walter Falk. Would you please introduce yourselves first?"

He watched them carefully. On first sight, those young people, all except for Elyas, seemed ordinary and in comparison even boring. There were two red haired girls, that were nicely dressed in blouses, who looked worried, a brunette, which wore an oversized grey t-shirt and seemed angry and a boy in a striped shirt, who nervously tucked a bandage around his left hand, again and again.

The friends looked at each other, but kept quiet.

"We don't have all day.", Jones said.

"If no one else does, I will start.", Elyas said and stood up, "This, next to me, is my lovely sister Audrey. She's an alcoholic, because her blog isn't as good as mine. Over there, we have Grace Myers and Jeffrey Gardner. They have a DIY-YouTube-Channel, but it is not that good. They have less than 100k subscribers.

And then there is Claudia Morston. She is our Photographer and overly sensitive."

"Don't call me that.", Claudia said in a whiny voice. Then she and her friends giggled.

Elyas waited for a moment, then he added: "Not here with us today, is our dear friend Walter Falk, responsible for the editing of the videos and the grammar of our blogs. He had gone for a walk and hasn't been seen since."

"He won't answer his phone.", one of the red haired girls said.

"It's so typical of him.", Jeffrey said.

"We have no idea, where he could be. He doesn't even know anyone here."

Barnaby had the feeling, that they had agreed on their story before they got there. The way Elyas had told it, had sounded a bit too theatrical. But on the other hand, he seemed to always sound dramatic, when he talked.

But then again, there were the friends, who used the exact same phrases.

John watched Ben, who scribbeled something in his notebook, thoughtfully.

"And in which kinds of relationships are you to Mr. Falk?"

"We are friends.", Audrey mumbled and crossed her arms.

"Some more, some less.", Jeffrey chuckled.

Barnaby noticed angry eyecontacts between the friends.

"Would you elaborate, please?"

"No.", Grace whispered.

"We know each other since Kindergarten. Of course there have been relationships.", Claudia said.

"Yes. Everyone was kinda f*ing with everyone, sooner or later.", Jeffrey said and shrugged.

Grace giggled hysterically.

"Language, Precious." Elyas shook his head.

"And who was his latest girlfriend?", Jones asked.

"That should be our lovely Audrey.", Elyas said.

Audreys face went red. And Jones noticed, that Graces face did the same thing.

Barnaby nodded and then asked: "Would you mind, if I asked, how it came to your injury, Mr. Gardner?"

"Razor blade.", Grace answered quickly, "We were working with Chopsticks, rubberband and-"

"Being clumsy, like he always is, he cut himself, building a rabbit made of rubbish.", Claudia said, with a shy smile.

"And rubbish the video is.", Audrey murmured under her breath.

"It was a nice idea, though. Any more questions, we can answer, Mr. Barnaby?", Elyas asked, eyes shining.

"No, thank you. Don't leave midsomer. That was all."

When they were just about to leave, Elyas suddenly grabbed Barnabys hand.

"Here is my number, in case you want to question me again.", Elyas whispered, smiling towards the Detective Chief Inspector.

And the way he said it, made Jones somehow feel sick.

"You know, when I was a kid, I always wanted to know, what it's like to be a detective. I read all those Agatha Christie books." Elyas smiled, while Jones glared at him.

"I know like everything about the french guy."

"That's ... nice.", Barnaby said, smiling politely.

And then they fled.

~~M~~~.


	3. chapter 2,5

As soon as he had closed the cars door, Barnaby said: "Poirot is from Belgium, by the way. It' s the first thing you learn, when you read the books."

"Who is what? Which books?", Jones asked.

"Never mind."

"...Do you think, they are hiding something?", Jones asked after a while.

"Of course they are. ...At the end of the day everyone is."

They drove back to the station, where they did some research on popular blogs on the internet, when Barnaby suddenly asked: "Is there something wrong, Jones?"

"It's nothing."

"Just tell me."

"I'm fine."

"I don't think so."

"You know what? Deduce it, Detective Chief Inspector!",Jones sJones said, somehow nervously.

Barnaby stood up, walked towards Jones and smiled mildly, when his Sergeant backed off, crossing his arms.

"It has to do something with Mr Sanchez. Doesn't it? You don't like the way, he lookes at me. Am I right?"

"Sir, I'm sure he is just playing with us...", Jones said under his breath.

"So you are jealous, because you are usually the one, who is liked by the suspects. Am I right?"

"No, you are not.", Ben said and looked awfully offended.

Barnaby just smiled and sat back on his place, pretending, that nothing had happened.

After a while, Jones asked: "We'll need more information about the suspects. There are no records about them. So who is watching the videos and who is reading the blog?"

"I thought we could do that together. Let's start with the videos. Right after I went with Sykes for his evening walk."

~~M~~~

Barnaby had the feeling, that he was being followed.

Every few steps he turned around, but nobody was there.

Maybe he was just paranoid.

Once more he wished that Jones had accompanied him. But his Sergeant had claimed to be too tired to go for a walk with Sykes and him.

The DCI decided, he wanted to stay close to the street lamps, so he chose to walk another way than the day before.

As soon as the dog realized, that they were walking in the wrong direction, Sykes sat down and looked stubborn.

"No, we are going that way.", Barnaby said and pulled on the leash.

Sykes slid over the ground and sat down again.

"No.", Barnaby said.

Sykes looked in the direction of the burnt tree.

"Listen, we've talked about this."

But the dog sat still like a statue, facing the way he wanted so desperately to go.

For a few moments, Barnaby watched him, reevaluating the situation.

After that, the DCI sighed, lifted the dog up and carried him home.

~~M~~~

Jeffrey flipped away all sorts of crumbs from the dark fabric and then sat down on the couch in the living room and scribbled something on a piece of paper.

Audrey sat next to him. She looked over his shoulder. The drawing looked a bit like a duck. But it could have also been a horse ...or a tractor ...or a diary entry. She folded her hands, bit her lips, sighed and then finally said: "Are you sure, you don't know, where Walt is?"

Jeffrey didn't even look up. He concentrated on the drawing or whatever it was supposed to be. "Hey, I wish, i knew where he is as well! He still has my DVD.", he said.

Audrey saw, that he wasn't taking the whole thing seriously. She rolled her eyes and asked:

"I can look in our room, if you like me to. Which one is it?"

"It's the one with the naked old lady on the cover."

Audrey stared at him, grossed out. Then she stood up and left the room.

~~M~~~

Later in the evening, the DI and the DS connected their work- Laptop with the big TV-screen in Barnabys house and started to watch Grace's and Jeffrey's YouTube-Channel.

One Video after another.

'DIY with J. and G.'

"I don't like the thought of them earning money, because we are doing research.", the Sergeant said and skipped the advertisement.

He was bored, before the intro was over.

"And they are not even good.", Barnaby said, as Jeffrey glued a paper ship together and cut his fingers in the process. The DCI chuckled and reached for their freshly made Popcorn.

"Why are they even uploading these?" Jones choked and caughed as Jeffrey accidentally glued parts of the ship to his t-shirt.

The videos with the most views were those, with Elyas gueststarring in them. And Jones had to admit, that they also were the best. Well, compared to the others.

They were all kinda terrible. Grace was talking too fast and in a way that was annoying, using fancy words, where they didn't belong. And Jeffrey was, if you put it nicely, clumsy.

They sighed simultaneously. Sykes, who had sat in front of them, watching them carefully, now jumped onto the sofa and laid down on both their laps. The detectives started to pet him.

When their hands met, they realised, how close they were sitting to each other. So they awkwardly moved further away, which made Sykes fall from their laps, on the space between them. They acted like nothing had happened, while Sykes laid his head on his paws.

After something, that felt like an eternity, Jones groaned and said: "I don't see anything useful, Sir."

"Should we call it a day?"

"Sure."

Barnaby stood up, streched his hurting limbs and turned the Videos off. "Would you like to stay for a small midnight snack, Ben? I suddenly have the feeling, that I would like to make some waffles. What do you think? Maybe double cream-"

"I think, that we should think about moving in together.", he answered absently.

"Excuse me?", Barnaby asked startled almost dropping the empty Popcorn-bowl.

Jones laughed shortly. "I was joking. I have the feeling, that I spend much more time here, than at my place.", he stuttered.

"Well..." Barnaby cleared his throat.

"I really should go home, now. I've already spent so much time here. What would our collegues think, if anyone found out? ...And I know that you actually don't like guests... And with Sarah not being here... I'm better leaving, now.", Jones mumbled quickly, focusing at the not very clean floor.

"But... Of course. You are right. Good night then, Jones." Barnaby tried to smile confidently.

It failed.

"Good night, Sir.", the Sergeant said and left reluctantly, hoping, that the DCI would call him back, while Barnaby was hoping, that Jones would turn around and ask if he could stay anyway.

But neither of them did anything.

So they both were soon left alone to their own thoughts.

~~M~~~

Author's note:

I have a dog, so I know what I am talking about. XD

Also: tell me what you think!

Constructive criticism is welcome, of course.

Have a nice day/night!

...and I also wanted to tell you, that I'll need a little more time for the next chapter, so meanwhile you could check out my other fanfic 'why', if you haven't already.

They kinda belong together anyway. :)


	4. chapter 3

"Any new cases or do we have to bother Mr Sanchez and his friends again, Sir?", Jones asked half jokingly, after he had brought a cup of tea to Barnabys desk in the morning of the next day.

"Both."

"Both?", Jones asked, somehow surprised.

"You heard me. Claudia Morston died this morning.", Barnaby answered sternly.

"Oh, no! Wh-"

"Hurry up! They called almost twenty minutes ago.", Barnaby said as he put his jacket on.

They quickly left the room, leaving the still warm tea behind on their desk.

~~~M~~~

"Sir, you have to admit, it does look a lot like an accident."

"I don't believe in accidents, Jones."

The DCI and his Sergeant stood on the pavement, close to a traffic light, that constantly changed from green to red and back again, although the streets were closed, now.

"I know, Sir. But she got hit by a bus, while writing text messages or something. It just seems to be an accident. A tragic one. She got brought to the hospital, but it already was too late. Things like that happen sometimes. Accidents happen, Sir."

"Don't you think, that it's strange, that Elyas and Audrey were with her, when she died?"

"Do you think they pushed her? Maybe he needs a story for his blog. Actually I can't really imagine anyone doing this... Unless ... On the other hand, maybe-"

"People have killed for much less, Jones."

"I remember."

"Where is the busdriver?", Barnaby asked.

"He is in the hospital as well. He's under shock and has to get medication. Also he claims, that he didn't even see her. It looks like he drove too fast.", Jones read his notes.

The detectives looked at the bus again. The red bloodstains on the red-coloured bus were almost unrecognizable, even from a short distance.

They talked to the people, who were close by, when the accident (or murder) had happened. No one had seen anything, most of them being occupied with their phones.

'This is, where technology had brought us. No one is seeing the world around him anymore.', Jones thought by himself.

~~~M~~~

The detectives drove to the hospital, where Elyas and Audrey still were, waiting, although there was nothing left to be waited for.

"Are you seriously writing on that blog- thingie already?", Jones exclaimed, when he saw Elyas with his phone in his hand, somehow disappointed, because it could mean, that they've been right.

"I'm writing to Claudias Mum! She doesn't know yet. Someone has to tell her.", Elyas cried.

"We are sorry for your loss.", Barnaby said with a sideglance to Jones.

"Thank you.", Audrey whispered.

She looked tired and honestly sad, which was underlined by the black shadows under her eyes, while Elyas looked furious, his black eyeliner smirred all over his face. He certainly had been crying.

'Maybe they are truly shocked.', Jones thought.

"You have to tell us exactly, what happened", Barnaby said calmly.

"We don't know, what happened."

"We thought, you were with her?", Jones asked.

"We were, but we weren't paying attention.", Audrey said with her voice raspy. "We only saw her ... And then she didn't move." She shook her head, eyes wide open, like she couldn't escape the image.

"We were writing or something on our phones, while waiting at the traffic lights. All three of us and suddenly she just started walking.", Elyas said and sobbed.

"What did she do with her phone?"

"She usually plays that game... The one with the cupcakes. What was its name again?"

Audrey shrugged and then focused on the floor again.

"You have to get cupcakes of the same colour in a row and-"

But Jones interrupted him: "Did you notice anything else? Were you standing there alone- only the three of you?"

"Yes, we were alone, I think.", Audrey said.

"You think?", Barnaby asked and crossed his arms.

"Like I said: we weren't paying attention."

"You think, that it wasn't an accident. Don't you?", Elyas asked, his voice sounding broken.

"It's our job to ask those questions. We are sorry, if we are hurting your feelings.", the DCI said. The Sergeant didn't look, like he was sorry.

Barnaby cleared his throat and said: "Ok, that was all. You shouldn't leave midsomer and please call us, if you remember anything of importance."

"Wait." Elyas stepped forward and grabbed Barnabys arm. "I swear, we didn't push her. Why in the world would we do that?"

Barnaby only smiled politely and said: "We will find out, what happened. We always do."

Then they left.

~~~M~~~

"Great. Just great.", Audrey said, as Elyas entered the room again, "Our friend died in front of us, we are freaking murder suspects and all you think about is hitting on the damn detective inspector."

Elyas rolled his eyes, but couldn't think of a witty comment fast enough.

"This was exactly, what we needed.", she then added sarcastically, as her brother didn't answer.

"I wonder, if they are observing us."

"Damn it, Ely."

"This is your fault."

"No, it is Walts fault."

"What about Claud?"

"Don't fight with me, honey. We should-."

"Oh, Shut up."

"You shut up."

And this went on for a while.

~~~M~~~

When they sat in their car, Jones asked: "So don't you think, that we can actually say, that it was an accident? It's quite obvious. Isn't it, Sir?"

"I don't believe in accidents, Jones."

"But, what if-"

"Didn't you know, that people can be manipulated into starting to walk, when they concentrating on something else?"

"No, I didn't. So that's what your degree in psychology is for. Right?"

"I've recently seen a documentary about manipulating teens. In easy words: it was shown that if you are waiting in a crowd at a station, in line or at a traffic light and the group of people around you, starts to move, it is most likely, that you start to move too."

"Very interesting. So you think, they both killed her. But how are you going to prove it?"

"Were there any cameras around? I could prove it with video footage.", Barnaby mused.

Grace watched her friends suspiciously.

Her face showed a mixture of expressions, as she left the house.

"Where are you going?", Elyas yelled after her, but she didn't answer.

She walked and walked and walked and soon she stood in a white and uncomfortably cold room, tears in her eyes. Her surroundings became blurred.

"Hey! You! You are not allowed to be here! ...How did you even get here?", the substitute for the usual pathologist, who suddenly appeared next to her, asked.

"I want to see my friend.", Grace cried. She shivered. It had been a mistake to go there in a light summer dress. But she wouldn't have known the exact dress code for a place like that any way.

"Shhh. You need to get out of here.", Dan Peterson said, and shoved her in the direction of the exit.

"I want to say goodbye to her. Please!"

Her voice echoed a bit.

"This is what funerals are for."

"Please! Where is she?"

"I'm going to call security."

"Please!" She grabbed his arm and he hesitated. The girl looked so miserable.

"Fine. What is her name?"

"Claud - Claudia Morstan.", she said with hope in her eyes.

"Oh, I'm sure you don't want to see *her*. I'm only half finished with her."

As he smiled, he showed his teeth.

Grace gasped. And he looked at her thoughtfully, before he added: "I still have her cut open. ...Have you ever seen a real human heart?"

She backed away.

"What about kidneys?", he yelled after her as she turned around and ran away. The door banged loudly.

"I sometimes start to feel a bit lonely down here.", he told the corpse closest to him.

The corpse didn't answer. So he took a scalpel and started to work.


	5. chapter 3,5

"There are no signs of poisonings. She died because of inner bleedings.", Jones said, after he had ended a phonecall, back at the station. "Also there are no cameras around, that caught the ... incident."

"There is something, we are missing.", Barnaby mused.

"Please, tell me, we don't have to watch the videos again, Sir."

"No, but it's time, that we read Elyas' and Audreys' blogs.", Barnaby said, fingers already on the keyboard.

Audreys posts mainly were reviews of books and movies, always written in such a sarcastic tone, that was more than amusing, while Elyas wrote about seemingly everything: from recipes, over TV-Shows to fashion trends and trips to Europe. His humour was different from hers. It was much less dark.

After quite some time, Jones said: "Look at her. Who is that girl? She is on several different photos."

He pointed at the picture of a girl with very long chocolate brown hair, which was sitting next to Audrey and Grace in a café in Paris, eating Baguette with cheese.

But there was nowhere a name to be seen.

They printed the photos out.

"It's half past ten.", Barnaby said. "It's a little too late to talk to Elyas and Audrey again." Also he didn't really have the nerve to see them again so soon. Additionally he wasn't sure, if it would help them with the case, finding out, who the girl on the photo was.

"Yes, Sir. We should talk to them again first thing tomorrow morning."

They packed their things.

"What do you think about dinner?", Jones suddenly asked.

"Actually I'm hungry since we were at the crime scene.", Barnaby said with a smile.

"This time, we can eat at my place. ...I insist on it.", Jones said.

"I'm ok with that. We only have to go to my place first and get Sykes. I should have fed him an hour ago. He probably already got angry and hid my socks again."

~~~M~~~

Sykes had been waiting patiently for hours.

The dog had his own understanding of what was necessary and important. Some kind of duty, he was aware of.

He waited patiently focussing the door, as stubborn as a dog could get.

Tail wiggeling at every movement from outside, he didn't leave his spot for even a short moment. From where he sat, he could perfectly hear everything, what happened outside. All the important sounds.

Every car.

Every voice.

Every footstep.

And even one squirrel.

The squirrel was exceptionally annoying.

Soon it would be time, for his master to come home. But you could never know. Maybe he was going to be early or late.

Sykes didn't want to take a chance.

~~~M~~~

Jeffrey sat down on the sofa, placed a sixpack next to him as well as a bag of chips and changed the channel.

"Jerk.", Audrey said under her breath. She was leaning against the doorframe of the kitchen, her arms crossed.

Jeffrey threw a handful of chips in her direction. He missed.

"Don't you start to fight again. This is not the time for this, honey.", Elyas said without looking up. He sat on the floor next to the couch, and wrote something on his tablet.

"Whatever.", Jeffrey said.

His sister had already picked up a book from one of the shelves and acted like she wanted to throw it in his direction.

Grace, who just had sat down next to him, flinched, while Jeffrey didn't even pay attention.

"For F's sake. Calm down, Aud."

"I wanted to watch this.", she pouted.

"You weren't even in the room.", Jeffrey said.

"Ok. ...LISTEN HERE , YOU LITTLE-"

Then Grace jumped and ran away, crying.

"Well done, Aud. I'll go and talk to her.", Elyas said as he clapped slowly and stood up.

"You are not good with that."

"You aren't either. And someone has to do it."

From the other room, they heard Grace yelling: "Leave me alone!"

But they went after her anyway.

~~~M~~~

Barnaby packed a few things. More stuff for the dog than for himself.

Sykes tried his hardest to call Barnabys attention to him.

Barnaby wouldn't look.

The dog barked accusingly, put his paws on his master's leg and chewed the carpet a bit more.

Barnaby didn't seem to notice, walked through the rooms and the stairs up and down again. He searched for something in the closet, talking to himself, quietly.

So Sykes saw, that he had no other choice.

He raised a leg and-

"Sykes! Bad dog! What are you doing?"

"Sir, is something wrong?", Jones asked from the other room.

"I quickly have to clean something up.", Barnaby said, shaking his head disappointedly at Sykes.

The dog didn't look the slightest bit ashamed.

Maybe even a bit annoyed with his master.

"Do you want to tell me something?"

Sykes barked.

"You'll get dinner as soon, as we arrive at Ben's.", Barnaby said in a calming voice.

Sykes tilted his head. Then he gave up.

~~~M~~~

Elyas paced the living room over and over, while talking on the phone.

"Mrs Morstan!... No... Definitely not ... I am sooo sor-... No!... Don't you yell at me!", Elyas hung up.

Audrey cringed. "How dare she being upset, that her daughter died.", she said sarcastically while pouring herself another glass of liquor.

"You didn't hear what she was calling me!"

"Couldn't you have been at least a bit sympathetic for once?"

"Hell no."

"Idiot."

"...I miss Claud.", Elyas said quietly after a while.

"I know. I miss Claud too."

She laid an arm around his shoulders as he sat down next to her.

~~~M~~~

About half an hour later, the DCI and the Sergeant were at Ben's place. Barnaby was surprised at how clean the living room was.

Noticing the look on his face, Jones said: "It's so tidy, because I'm barely here."

A bit later, they were sitting on the couch in front of the TV and Barnaby was sharing a piece of pizza with Sykes, when Jones suddenly asked: "If you don't mind me asking, Sir: Did Sarah call you back?"

Barnaby froze. "No.", he then said flatly.

"Do you ... you know ... Do you want to talk about it?", Jones asked reluctantly, clearly uncomfortable with the situation.

"No, I don't.", Barnaby said, without taking his eyes off Sykes. "At least not today."

"Ok.", Jones said halfheartedly focussing on a point somewhere on the wall.

And they watched TV, until Barnaby and Sykes fell asleep on the couch and Jones silently left, to sleep in his bedroom, after carefully taking a blanket and tucking in Sykes and the slightly snorring Detective Chief Inspector.

 _Author's note:_ _First of all: thanks for reading! What are your thoughts?_ _I'll try to post the next chapter a bit faster._ _The formatting is a huge problem for me and I don't know why. Does anyone else have this problem?_ _One more thing:_ _I have to admit that Dan Peterson was my favourite pathologist in Midsomer. He was so scary- but in a good way. So I brought him back._ _(He appears in early episodes like death of a stranger, judgement day, strangler's wood and dead man's eleven.)_


	6. chapter 4

It didn't happen often, that he felt that uncomfortable before he had to talk to a possible suspect. Barnaby glanced at Jones, who seemed to feel the same way, before he reluctantly knocked on the front door. They heard shouting, whispering and then steps.

Elyas smiled brightly when he opened the door. He wore a greenish-blueish robe-like something.

Jones didn't know how to call it, he only knew, that he found it ridiculous.

"You can't get enough of me, Mr Barnaby. Can you?", Elyas said, shaking his head and smirking playfully, "Please, do come in."

"We have more questions about your friends, Mr Sanchez.", Jones said, after clearing his throat loudly.

"Oh, I'm sure you have. Don't we want to get a little comfortable first? Maybe-"

"Shut up, Ely. I'm sorry, detectives. I have to apologise for my stupid brother. He is drunk.", Audrey, who was sitting on the sofa, quickly said, as they entered the living room. She wore a dark jogging suit, which didn't seem to be very clean.

"Don't listen to her. She is drunk too."

"It's nine o'clock in the morning.", Jones stated, not really trying to hide his disgust.

"But it's Sunday.", Elyas pouted.

"It's Wednesday."

The dectives shared a look.

"Oh.", Elyas said and sat down next to Audrey on the couch. "Please, do have a seat." And he gestured to the empty space next to him, looking at Barnaby.

The detectives kept standing where they were, feeling even more uncomfortable.

Then Barnaby sighed and asked: "Do you see yourself able, to answer our questions?"

"You may have to torture me a little. -Well, actually I have a few questions myself and-"

"Ely, shut the hell up.", Audrey whispered very loudly..

"How was the relationship between Walter Falk and Claudia Morston?", Barnaby asked nevertheless.

The young suspect became as serious as he could and answered: "Like we said: there were many relationships between us over the years.

I think most recently Claud was in no relationship at all. She had kept more to herself and Grace. Well, Claud was so... Claud was Claud. She'd never let you know, what she was thinking."

"Could you tell us, who that girl on this picture is?", Jones asked, handing them the photos.

"That's our sister Peggy.", Audrey said hoarsely after a while of them just staring at the photos."What does she have to do with this?", she asked.

"They ask the question, honey.", Elyas said and couldn't hold back a giggle.

Jones focused merely on his notes, as he asked: "Where is she?"

"She stayed in London.", the young man answered.

"Hasn't got a thing for vacations anymore." His sister shrugged.

"No arguments?"

"No arguments." Brother and sister shook their heads.

"We might have more questions later. We-"

"You are always welcome here, Mr Barnaby.", Elyas said with a sideglance towards Jones, "But I can assure you, we haven't killed anybody."

"They are here again. Why are they here again?", Grace asked, as she stumbled into the living room, still wearing her pink pyjamas. Her eyes were red and her hair was a mess.

"They are questioning us, honey."

Her eyes widened. "What have you done?", Grace asked in horror.

"We have to question all of you, Ms Myers."

"All of us?", Audrey asked and stood up. "JEFFREY! GET YOUR A* IN THE F*NG LIVING ROOM! THE POLICE IS HERE.", she yelled.

"Language, honey." Elyas shook his head disapprovingly.

His sister let herself fall on the couch once more. She looked tired.

"Hey.", Jeffrey said, when he came into the living room. He wore Jeans and a black T-shirt.

Jones noted that he looked the least sad.

"Where were you yesterday morning at 8:00 o'clock, Ms Myers and Mr Gardner?"

"Here. Eating breakfast. Usually we would be still asleep, but Claud, Ely and Aud were making quite a bit of noises, when they went to go shopping."

"We wanted to get food to cook for lunch.", Elyas elaborated.

"Yeah. We never got there.", Audrey murmured, obviously lost in her thoughts.

"YOU! You wanted Salad, you f*ing vegan. If you could just eat one f*ingn steak for lunch for once, Claud would still be here.", Grace suddenly screamed at Jeffrey.

The others flinched.

"I'm sorry." He threw his hands up in surprise.

Grace kept shouting at Jeffrey until he escaped the room.

The young woman broke down, her red hair fell like a curtain in front of her face, as she sobbed loudly.

"Damn it, Grace. Stop being a ... a... You know what I mean. It's no ones fault and you know it.", Audrey said softly and took another sip out of her glass, now filled with a clear substance.

"Shut up.", her friend screamed suddenly in a shrill voice and ran out of the room as well.

Audrey stood up unsteadily and put her glass down. "GRACE! Don't hide in the damn bathroom! I think I have to throw up." She stumbled a few steps. "No, I'm SURE, I have to throw up."

She escaped the room.

"Honey, don't ruin the carpet again! We just got it cleaned.", Elyas yelled and went after her.

Jones and Barnaby suddenly found themselves alone in the huge living room.

"Are we done?"

"Yes, I think so."

And they quietly left the house.

~~~M~~~

"I can't help but thinking, that we don't have any cases. Maybe Mr. Falk just ran away, tired of his terrible friends and Ms Morstan just had an accident.", Jones said, when they sat in their car again.

Barnaby shook his head almost in annoyance, but didn't answer, concentrating on the traffic.

There was a bunch of cyclists in front of them. They were occupieing the whole street and Barnaby was on the edge to getting really annoyed and making himself heard.

"Sir, come on, please. Just tell me, what you think."

Barnaby stared out of the window, but then finally said: "Maybe Mr. Falk was killed by Ms. Morstan, but then she felt guilty and jumped in front of the bus on purpose."

"You have a point. ...Or maybe Mr Falk killed Ms Morstan and then went hiding again."

"But how could he have done it, without all his friends knowing?"

"Maybe they all killed them together. We had cases before, where a several friends were protecting each other and-"

"I wonder, if they could be really that good at acting."

Barnaby changed his hands' position on the steering wheel, ready to honk.

"Or maybe it was one of their fans, for some reason.", he said.

"Or one of their rivals." The sergeant nodded, shifting nervously in his seat.

The car had to slow down a bit more and they looked out of the carwindow in separate directions

"And I can't believe, we still don't have anything solid."

~~~M~~~

The windows really needed to be cleaned sooner rather than later, Audrey noted, as she stood in the living room, head leaned against the cool glass and trying to ignore her friends' bantering, while watching the clouds.

Jeffrey looked over Elyas' shoulder, who tried to hide his open text document.

"It isn't very necessary to hide a blank page. Don't you think?"

Elyas only frowned.

"Did Bill call you by the way?"

His shoulders tensed.

"He moved away.", Grace said quietly.

Jeffrey laughed. "Oh, how tragic. What a pity, you didn't-"

"I wonder, why we even keep you around. You are wasting my precious time."

Jeffrey laughed again. "Because of my exquisite Repertoire of Fart jokes."

"Come on, spell 'Repertoire'.", Elyas dared him. "In case you can find the dictionary."

"I don't need a dictionary." He pulled out his phone and then put it back. "There is no battery left."

"Bloody thing."

"Don't you sometimes wish, you had something you could read on, but didn't need a battery for?", he asked.

"Like an actual book?", Audrey grumbled sarcastically.

She watched a colourful bird, which sat on a nearby tree, cleaning its feathers, as she tried to zone out.

If you spend 24/7 with people you despise, it becomes hard to keep your sanity.

Dark thoughts clouded her mind. And as she turned around, her 'friends' seemed to be equally down.

"Do you, guys, sometimes think about how times have changed, since we were really young?", Grace asked quietly.

"All the time.", Audrey answered, rolling her eyes, "When I was thirteen, I didn't need alcohol and drugs to enjoy my friends. Today I don't need my friends to enjoy alcohol and drugs."

And with that, she left the room.

~~~M~~~

When they were back in their office, Jones suddenly said, after a while of staring at his computer: "Sir, look at this most recent post:

Yesterday, we lost our dear friend Claudia Morston-"

"I can read it myself. Thank you, Jones."

"...Sir, do you think, he is just searching for attention, or is he actually grieving?"

"I wish I knew. But what I think I know, is how to find out. Mr. Sanchez has written in his facebookthing, that he's about to go to a party tomorrow night in the Pink Feather's in Causton. Maybe it's time to do something different with our freetime."

"Which freetime?", Jones asked sarcastically, but still smiling.

"Well it's a party after all. If you don't want to go there with me, I'll find someone else."

Jones sensed, that the Detective Chief Inspector was pretending to be hurt, to cover up, that he really was a bit hurt, so he said: "Sir, it would be a pleasure, to go there with you!"

"I'm flattered." Sarcasm. Again.

The Sergeant rolled his eyes.

"Unless..."

"Don't be a chicken, Jones."

"Wait- what?"

For the rest of the day, they were mainly just sorting through documents and more or less waiting for something to happen, until they went back to Jones' home, officially, because the dog was still there.


	7. chapter 4,5

The friends were preparing dinner, some kind of salad with crisps, and even after years long practice they encumbered each other. All of them were in a more foul mood than before.

"Aren't you going to do something about it?", Audrey asked under her breath, as she opened another bottle of beer.

"About what?", Elyas aked, as he washed a cucumber in the worst way possible.

"Bill-"

"I don't care about the one, that shall not be named.", he answered louder than particularly necessary.

"Rubbish.", Audrey said.

Grace stopped cutting the onions, took a deep breath and opened her mouth-

"Grace! Shouldn't you be reading something ...or something?", Jeffrey asked, as he searched for something in the cupboards.

She glared wordlessly in his direction.

He didn't even care.

"You, guys, are so annoying right now.", Elyas said. He hid his sister on the arm with the cucumber.

"You know, you kinda deserve that.", Jeffrey said, when Audrey flinched and stepped back.

~~~M~~~

Barnaby stared at Sykes. Sykes stared at Barnaby.

"I won't repeat myself. Where are Sergeant Jones' socks?"

"How did he even open the drawer?", Ben asked, standing there barefoot and already getting cold.

Sykes acted, like he didn't understand the questions.

"At least now I know, what to get you for Christmas, Ben."

"New socks. Thank you, Sir."

"You're welcome."

The dog barked twice and then stood up, tail wagging.

"I think, he wants to tell you, that it is your fault, because you wanted us to come here."

"Tell him, I'm sorry, if I offended him.", Jones said sarcastically.

Barnaby smirked. "I'm sorry, but you have to tell him that yourself. ...It's not about being here. It's about him not getting fed, when he got hungry. I'll give him some of the muffins, when they are done."

"Do you ever feed him actual dog food?", Jones asked.

Before Barnaby could answer, Sykes started growling angrily, which made Ben step back.

"He says, that you should mind your own business."

"This time I understood him. ...How do you still have the power to bake something in the middle of the night, Sir?", Jones asked and sat on the kitchen table, watching him.

"It's ten past seven, Jones.", Barnaby murmured, as he looked through the cupboards.

When the rooms just started to fill with the pleasant smell of chocolate muffins, the doorbell suddenly rang.

Jones was upstairs having a shower, so Barnaby opened the door.

"Good evening.", he said.

"Good evening. Sorry, but who are you?", a confused looking young woman asked.

"I'm John. Are you here because of Ben?"

"Yes, I'm Jessica by the way. Did Ben move away?"

"No, he is upstairs having a shower. Do you want me to tell him something? I just made chocolate muffins. Would you like some?"

Jessica suddenly started to smile brightly. "Well, that explains some things."

"Yes, those brown stains on me are from the dough. Nothing to worry about.", Barnaby answered smiling back mildly.

She grinned and threw her hair over her shoulder. "This isn't, what I meant. Oh. My. God. This explains so many things."

"What did you mean?"

Then Jones appeared behind him. His hair was still a bit wet, he was wearing more comfortable clothes and he was (of course) still barefoot.

"Who was- Oh, hello, Jessica.", he said coldly.

"Hi, Ben. I see, you are moving on as well.", she said, grinning towards Barnaby. They stared at each other. First there was confusion.

Then Barnaby went white, when he understood. He stepped back.

"What do you want, Jessica?", Jones asked and crossed his arms.

"I think you still have my favourite salad bowl, Benny. Your ...friend-"

"No, I don't. Good night.", Jones said and simply shut the door with a loud bang.

Unfortunally it didn't hit her face.

"Wasn't that a bit rude?", Barnaby asked.

There were muffled swearwords to hear from outside.

"I think she is starting to stalk me. Over the past few days, she had sent me about twenty text messages.", Jones whispered.

"Maybe she wants you back..."

There were angry knocks on the door.

"Maybe I need police protection.", the Sergeant whispered loudly with a half smile.

More swearwords.

"I'm very capable of protecting you myself."

"Thank you, Sir.", Jones said, surpressing an eyerolling.

One final knock, then some muffled swearwords, that sounded to come from further away.

"Are you sure, you don't have that saladbowl? It seems to be quite a special one.", Barnaby asked, when they went back to the kitchen to eat dinner.

"I gave everything she left here to the church, so they could give it to the poor. So technically I don't have her saladbowl. By the way, it was pink with purple flowers on it. Honestly I wouldn't wonder, if they threw it away."

~~~M~~~

Jeffrey couldn't sleep, but he didn't want to go through the cold house to the kitchen, although he was a bit hungry.

Nothing tastes quite as good, as ice cream in the middle of a silent night.

He fought with himself, until he lost.

So Jeffrey just sat in his room, minding his own business, when his phone suddenly rang. He didn't think for a second, that it could wake the others, and let it continue ringing the annoying melody.

Like so many other people, he felt very uncomfortable to talk on the phone, so he waited, until it stopped ringing, before he picked it up, with a frown.

The name on the display surprised him.

After a moment of careful consideration, he started writing a text message, a devilish smile in the corner of his mouth.

~~~

 **Author's note**

I hope you liked it -now things are going to get exciting! As you can guess: someone is about to get muuuurdered!

 **IMPORTANT** :

Don't forget to inform yourselves about the change in the _european copyright_ laws, _articles 11 and 13._

You might not be able to read european fanfiction anymore, or fanfiction in general if you live in europe -sadly I am european-, if we don't fight against it!

I really want to continue to read and write, and you probabaly do as well...


	8. chapter 5

AN

Brace yourselves, there is a bit of swearing coming ahead.

Just saying. 'Cause other authors seem to warn their readers.

Sorry, I'm still new to this and I don't get easily offended, soooo...

So 'don't like, don't read', I guess.

Without further ado:

Enjoy! :)

~~~M~~~

Audrey cleared her throat loudly, as she entered the kitchen.

"You know what? If you are not helping me, I'll tell Bill where you are hiding from him.", she said, as she opened the fridge.

"You're gonna live to rue it.", Elyas said, without looking up from his phone.

He sat crosslegged on the kitchen table.

Audrey put down the cheese next to him.

"Leave this poor detective alone. Bill misses you. I was talking to him the other day..."

"Stop talking nonsense."

"I-"

"Stop! Just stop it. Ok?"

He slid down from the table and pushed her out of his way as he left the room.

~~~M~~~

The day had seemed to take so much longer to creep by than usually.

When it finally was evening, they sat together in their car and stared at the club, in which they were sure, Elyas would be.

Barnaby cleared his throat and then asked: "Did you know, that people most often want those things even more, that they can't have?"

"I actually did. When I was much younger and playing with my cousin, I always wanted the toys, he was currently playing with- and the other way around.", Jones said. He smiled, thinking about that memory.

"And what do you think, does Elyas want?"

"Money,... Fame,..." Jones shrugged.

"And what else?"

It took him a moment. His eyes widened, when he realised the answer. "...You."

"This is going to be so much fun.", Barnaby said and Jones was unsure whether he meant it or not. But before he could ask, Barnaby got out of the car, went around it and opened the door for him.

"Let's pretend it's an undercover thing."

"What else would it be?"

They stared at each other, then Barnaby awkwardly took Jones' hand. None of them moved, until Jones freed his hand and asked:

"And now what? Do you seriously want to make him think, that there is more than ...respect between us?"

He looked stressed, as he ran his hand through his hair.

"Yes, and there certainly is, Ben. Loyalty for example and friendship and- do you want to solve the case or not?" Barnaby grabbed his arm once more and held him tightly.

"Sir! So we are seriously going in there?", Jones asked in panic.

"Yes, Jones- I mean: of course, my dear."

He smiled reassuringly.

~~~M~~~

"Maybe we should go on a holiday.", Audrey said as some kind of peace offering.

"This is our holiday, honey." Elyas answered. His face was illuminated by the phone's screen.

"It certainly doesn't feel like one.",

"Turn this frown upside down.", her brother answered without looking at her.

"Well... F* you."

"Language, honey."

"F* language too."

"Aud!"

"Listen, I-"

"You know what? Forget it."

She muttered something remotely unfriendly under her breath as she walked away.

"Wait.", Elyas suddenly yelled, "Come on. We can't spend the whole day fighting."

"Yes, we can."

"Don't be ridiculous. Do something with your hair, while I make dinner. I don't know, where the others are. So... More for us. Ok?"

He tried to sound cheerful, but the way his voice cracked, showed, how stressed he actually was.

Audrey gave in and disappeared into the bathroom, where she forgot, what she wanted to do there. So she used the toilet, washed her hands and then came back into the kitchen.

Elyas swallowed his comment and gave her a piece of bread with cheese on it.

"To soak up the alcohol.", he said and winked.

She rolled her eyes, but ate it anyway.

~~~M~~~

The sign blinked in pink letters 'The Pink Feathers'. It looked very out of place, sorrounded by the old buildings.

It probably was new, because Jones had never seen it, when he went to that corner of Causton.

The music was too loud, there were too many lights and colours and people.

Now he was secretly glad, that Barnaby was holding him. They surely would have lost each other. On the other hand it would have been his chance to escape ... this.

Whatever *this* was.

Everyone was wearing pink clothes. Most of them not many clothes at all. And there also was a lot of glitter.

The dancefloor was too crowded to tell a single person apart.

It was strange. Jones had no other words for it. He felt uncomfortable, felt like everyone's eyes were on them.

But he was released, when he didn't see any familiar faces. He didn't even know, why it was so important to him to not get recognized.

They stuck out of the crowd, both wearing their usual suits.

Jones cleared his throat, then shouted over the music: "They aren't here. Let's go-"

"Wait!"

"Why?"

"Even if they aren't here. Would you like to dance?"

They looked at each other, then they both laughed.

"Would you like something to drink?", Barnaby asked.

"Sure I do, but not here."

"Do you want to solve the case or not?", Barnaby whispered close to him, despite the loud music. He felt his warm breath against his ear.

Jones hesitated. But then he nodded, defeatedly.

So they sat down at one of the more quiet tables in a corner of the huge room. They were still awkwardly holding hands, until it finally appeared to them, that no one else was doing so.

And they let go of each other.

~~~M~~~

And Barnaby was right. 'Why does he always have to be right?', Jones thought to himself, somewhat annoyed by the whole situation. Because after about half an hour later, he caught a glimpse of Elyas in a neon pink shirt, a long pink feather...thingie and fitting sunglasses. And five minutes later Audrey waved at Jones, she and her brother approached them and they sat down at their table.

"Heyyy. Nice to see you.", the young man yelled.

"Nice to see you, too."

"Do you come here often?", Audrey asked.

"No.", Jones said.

"Yes.", Barnaby said.

They glanced at each other nervously.

"It's a lovely place isn't it?", Barnaby quickly added before he pretended to take another sip off his glass.

Audrey nodded. She chewed on her nails nervously. Then her hair.

Elyas wrote something on his phone, smiling absently.

Jones stared into blank space, obviously wishing to be somewhere else.

Barnaby watched all of them carefully.

It was close to impossible to keep a proper conversation going.

Time passed. They ordered drinks. The younger ones drank one glass of colourful alcoholic fluids after the other, while the detectives only pretended to drink.

A song about rainbows, unicorns and dancing was playing, when Audrey stood up and yelled "I feel sick."

"I'm shocked.", Elyas answered sarcastically.

"I need air.", she said, suddenly shaking.

"I'll help you. I'll bring you outside.", Jones said, actually being glad to have an excuse to leave this room of madness.

He shared a short glance with Barnaby and then left with the young woman as fast as they could.

"Finally.", Elyas said, smiling mischievously, when they were out of sight.

He leaned in closer. "We are alone."

~~~M~~~

"Do you feel better, now?", Jones asked.

"No, I don't." She leaned against the wall of the Pub with her eyes closed. It smelled less like smoke and beer and cheap parfume than inside.

The cold fresh air felt like small stitches in his face. Additionally he didn't feel good about leaving Barnaby alone with a murder suspect either. On the other hand again...

"Is there anything, I can do for you? Get your brother? Maybe some medicine or-"

"I want my friends back. Please bring my friends back." She let herself glide to the floor, suddenly sobbing uncontrollably.


	9. Chapter 5,5

Elyas slid uncomfortably close, to start a conversation.

"You probably read all my files and stuff and know everything about me. Why don't you tell me now a bit about yourself. Otherwise it would be pretty unfair. Don't you think?"

Barnaby shifted in his chair, but kept quiet.

Was he referring to something specific? Did they miss something, when they looked through the files?

"I asked my followers on twitter to send questions, they wanted to ask a real detective. Why did you want to be one?", Elyas asked.

"What?", Barnaby asked startled.

"A detective?"

"You planned this?"

"I'm always at least four steps ahead of others.", Elyas answered and winked.

The DCI watched him carefully before he decided to play along. "It's a family thing. Like you probably already know, there had been another Barnaby before me..."

"How long have you been one?"

"Quite long, I might say."

"What was the most horrifying thing, you have ever seen?"

"There were too many to even count them. We had a few cases involving incest. It's always terrible, when children are involved."

"How long have you known each other?"

"Not even that long."

"Do you have a pet?"

"A dog." He smiled shortly. Sykes was the goodest of all good boys...

Then he got earnest again.

"Which subjects did you hate in school?"

"History? I didn't like my teacher."

"What was your plan B?"

"Maybe a gardener."

Elyas laughed shortly: "A bit hard to imagine ... But on the other hand ..."

He laughed again, then shook his head.

"Next question: How much do you depend on technology or do you solve your cases more Sherlock-Holmes-Like?"

"A bit of both. But I see myself more as the Sherlock-Holmes-type of person."

"Have you ever had a case, involving anyone famous?", the younger one aked with a wink.

"I actually had some."

"Who?"

"I can't tell you that."

"Well I am famous.", he grinned, "Just in case you forgot. ...What is your favourite colour?"

"Chocolatebrown.", he said without hesitation.

Elyas blinked at that and looked like he thought about something unpleasant.

Then he just shook his head and asked: "If you could give my readers one important advice, what would that be?"

"Do. Not. Kill. People."

~~~M~~~

Audrey was a mess.

Jones was stressed out.

He felt the need to go back inside, to...

To...

To protect Barnaby.

Maybe.

It was hard to care less about, what Audrey was going through.

She mumbled something about her blog, but he wasn't really paying attention.

And it was hard to find a way, to make her feel better, so they could go back inside and...

He actually wanted to go home.

Going home sounded like a lovely idea.

...sitting at the kitchen table and watching Barnaby preparing dinner.

Then watching a movie or something together, until one of them fell asleep on the couch.

Then waking up to the smell of freshly made breakfast, then driving to work together and-

He lost his thread.

What was wrong with him?

~~~M~~~

On the inside, the music had changed. There were now slow songs playing and the dancefloor filled with couples.

"You do think, that we killed them. Don't you?", Elyas asked, quietly.

Barnaby could see the hurt in his eyes and wondered if anyone could be that good of an actor.

"If you did, I'm going to prove it."

"...Maybe you do have to torture me." He smiled. And his sunglasses reflected the flickering lights. "At least a little."

How could this strange smile be interpreted?

Did he want to flirt?

Or did he want to confess?

"I'll do whatever is necessary."

Elyas' smile widened.

"But what is that thing with your lovely Sergeant? You have been together for quite some time. Have you?"

"Yes. Sure."

"Are you happy?", Elyas asked, grabbing his hand, now desperately.

Barnaby came closer, looked him straight in the eyes and said: "I couldn't imagine anyone else by my side, then Ben."

~~~M~~~

"Do you ever wonder, how it could have ever come this far?", Audrey asked absently, her voice bitter.

First Jones wasn't sure, if she was even talking to him, but then he said: "You have no idea. I mean look at me. This was not, what I had expected, when I decided, that I wanted to work for the police."

"Why did you go to the police?"

"I wanted to save people. But as you see, I'm doing not as much saving, as I had intended. When I get called, it's usually too late. And there are so many people dieing here."

"That's sad." She seemed to calm down, now breathing more steadily.

"So... Your brother ... has he always been like this?"

"Why does everyone only have to talk about Elyas? Do *I* even exist?", Audrey suddenly screamed. Her shrill voice seemed to shock herself, as she started shaking more heavily once more.

"I'm sorry-"

"Does anyone ever want to know, what I want?", she asked more quietly, looking at him with huge watery eyes. "Elyas is so damn special. And don't get me started on poor Peggy. I -I hate everything. My whole f*ing life. So much."

"I just-"

"Don't you think I'm capable of murder? Women only murder with poison. Is that what you think. We always get-"

"DID you do it?", he suddenly yelled.

Silence. The grass moved under a soft breeze. Voices could be heard from inside as well as the music. Audrey breathed in and out. In and out. In and out, trying to calm herself down.

"No, I didn't.", she whispered. "But I could've."

Then she closed her eyes again.

"It's getting worse." She grimaced, clenching her teeth.

"Calm down and think about something nice?"

She started to cry more heavily again, covering her face with her hands.

"You are not thinking about something nice!"

"Do you know the feeling, when you just want to hug someone so badly...and... You just want to be loved ... And just want someone, who thinks that you are... beautiful and important...", she said between sobs.

"Yes, I do. I know exactly, what you mean.", he answered, his voice flat.

Jones stood there, not sure what to do. He looked down to her, then away again.

Not really wanting to hug and searching for another way to comfort her, he only reluctantly sat down next to her on the cold and slightly moisture ground, hands in his pockets.

"How is your blog going?"

Louder cries.

Then she suddenly stopped and said: "I think I have to throw up. Would you be so kind and hold my hair back, please?"

She ran over to the next garden and threw up in a bush, before Jones could react properly.

"Better?", he asked, trying not to look at her.

"Shit.", she just said.

Audrey shook her head. Her hands were cold like ice, when she grabbed Jones' arm. In the dim light he could see the blue tinged skin around her lips.

"Please, help.", she whispered.

"Were you poisoned?!", Jones asked in shock, when he appeared to see something strange in her eyes.

He dialed the emergency number as fast as he could.

"You don't say."

One last bit of sarcasm, before she passed out and laid next to the bush she had vomitted in.

Violet flowers surrounded her.

The garden owner would be mad the next morning, when he found out, that half of his garden was destroyed.

~~~M~~~

The music got faster again.

"Dance with me, John.", Elyas said only loud enough, so he could hear him.

"I can't.", Barnaby answered and stood up, because he wanted check on Ben and Audrey, who have been away for in his opinion far too long.

Elyas hummed, standing up as well.

"I'd like to-"

Elyas sang along with the Music, loudly. He tried to pull the Inspector closer, but got shoved away when Barnabys phone vibrated.

'We have a problem. Meet me at the hospital.', the text message said.

"Follow me, Elyas."

"The toilets are the other way." He said, confused.

"Excuse me?"

"What?"

"Ben texted me. They are at the hospital. Hurry up!"

Elyas sighed and rolled his eyes dramatically: "Damn it, Audrey's always such a party pooper."

Barnaby chose to ignore him, as he made his way through the crowd.

~~~M~~~

 _Author's note:_

As you can imagine, I had a terrible month, but I guess things will be better, now. So it goes. Right?

Please, feel free to leave a comment and tell me, what you think. :)

You can also follow me on tumblr if you want to talk or something.

Just look for abirdonalilactree.

Best wishes,

Sam.


	10. Chapter 6

Author's note

This is one of my favourite chapters so far.

I hope you'll enjoy it too.

In case you forgot: The story I tell here about Midsomer is my own invention, and it is not purported or believed to be part of Caroline Grahams story canon. The show is based on Caroline Graham's _Chief Inspector Barnaby_ book series, as originally adapted by one of my favourite authors Anthony Horowitz. This story is for entertainment only and is not part of the official story line.

Now that sounded professional.

Without further ado, here's the next part:

Chapter 6 -Blue

"No one is allowed, to go into her room at any time. Absolutely no one.", Barnaby said in his most intimidating voice.

His loud voice echoed in the almost empty hospital floor. The policeman, standing in front of Audreys room nodded. His expression didn't show any emotion. Jones rubbed his eyes. They had been awake for way too many hours.

The Sergeant sighed and added: "Except for the nurses and doctors. But you have to check their identities, before you let them in. We can't afford having another death, because someone walked around in their Halloween costume again. ...You won't believe how often this has happened before."

"Also Jenkins will come at eight and replace you. You will only leave, when it really is Jenkins, standing in front of you. Don't believe anyone making an excuse, that Jenkins was sick or something similarly stupid. I talked to him, this morning. He is fine. No one else but him will be sent here by us. Have I made myself clear, Fredericks?"

"Of course, Sir.", the policeman said.

~~~M~~~

Elyas, Jeffrey and Grace stood outside of the hospital. They stared up at the windows.

"Why are we not allowed to visit her?!" Grace yelled more than she asked. People on the street walking by, turned around and looked at her, as she pointed a finger at Barnaby accusingly.

"Because we don't know who tried to kill her.", he answered calmly.

"Why would we want to kill her!? We are her friends!"

"We are not even going to answer that.", Jones said.

"Where were you last night, before you came to 'The Pink Feathers'?'"

"We were at home, just like Grace and Jeffrey."

"What did you do? What did you drink? What did you eat? Who made dinner? Did one of you make drinks or something?", Jones asked.

"I'll make a list.", Elyas said, glancing at Barnaby, who acted, like he didn't notice or didn't care.

"Yeah, we had a lot of stuff mixed up yesterday. But we kinda all ate and drank the same stuff.", Jeffrey mumbled.

Grace started crying again.

This time quietly.

Elyas sighed. "Is there anything else we can do to help you, detectives?"

"That list would be helpful."

"Instead of searching for crime, where nothing is, you could concentrate more on finding our dear friend Walter.", Elyas said with a hint of accusation in his voice.

"We know very well how to do our jobs, thank you.", Jones said, more furious, than he had intended.

"What about your sister?"

"Wouldn't be the first time though, that old Aud had drank too much. Might not even be anything to be concerned about.", Jeffrey said.

Grace boxed his arm angrily and Elyas looked disappointed with those words.

"Anything else?", Jeffrey asked.

"Don't leave midsomer.", Barnaby answered weakly.

~~~M~~~

Back at the office, they sat in silence for a few minutes and stared at their blank desktops. Jones checked his phone a few times, while Barnaby stirred his tea.

Then the phone rang. Jones answered it.

Moments passed.

And then he hung up.

"It was the hospital, Sir."

"What did they say?"

"What do you think, they said?"

"They found nothing.", Barnaby mused, as he started pacing back and forth in front of his desk, "Didn't they? Just too much alcohol. Wasn't it?"

"Right. ...As always. She had alcohol poisoning which was most likely self-inflicted. She'll be fine.", Jones sighed. He looked tired.

"Do you want to know why?"

"You are going to tell me anyway. Aren't you, Sir?"

"If you say it like that, I won't tell you."

Moments passed. Then Barnaby leaned against his desk, facing Jones and said: "What if Audrey did this on purpose to make herself look like a victim?"

"I don't think, it's her. I think, it's Elyas wanting to get your attention."

"I don't think, it's him."

"Why? Because you like him? Sir?"

"He does have a good taste, doesn't he?"

The Sergeant glared at him.

"Of course I don't like him, Jones."

"He is hiding something."

"What could Grace's and Jeffrey's motive be?"

"But Elyas-"

"Maybe it is about money or something. Or something blog related."

"But Elyas-", Jones emphasized.

"Could you stop being jealous for just a second, Please? Thank you. We are trying to solve a murder."

"I'm not jealous!"

They stared at each other, then Barnaby started to arrange a few documents on his table differently, acting, like nothing had happened.

Jones sharpened a pencil, until it broke again. Then he threw it on his desk angrily and said: "What about taking a break? I'm exhausted."

"Some tea would be nice, thank you.", Barnaby said, without looking up. So he didn't see Jones staring at him.

When the Detective Chief Inspector didn't react, the Sergeant got up and left the room.

~~~M~~~

"Is it true?", a familiar voice behind Jones suddenly asked, as he stood in line at a nearby café to buy some tea for Barnaby and himself.

"What? Oh. Hi, Jessica." In the moment of surprise, he was barely able to hide his disappointment or his irritation, when seeing his exgirlfriend standing behind him.

"Is it really true, that you met Elyas, the blogger? You've been seen.", she asked in a false sugar sweet voice. "Lucy saw you. At least she said so. But I wouldn't believe her. And then she insisted. Lucky me I found you."

"Yeah. He's a suspect in a murder case."

"Tell me more." She leaned towards him, but he stayed distant.

"First: You know, that I can't. And second: you never cared before."

"But I do care. I realised how much I still care about you, Ben." Her smile didn't reach her eyes.

"How pathetic!"

"Why pathetic? You only know what you had, when you lost it. We were a good couple. I had a great time with you. Please, take my apology.", she said in a sweet voice. "Pretty please?"

Jones turned away. Disgusted.

"I certainly won't. You only want to meet Elyas. Just ... leave me alone, already."

Always being the one to break up a relationship or making decisions in general, Jessica wouldn't take a 'no' for an answer and got angry: "How dare you say that?"

"Jones! Why aren't you answering your phone?" Barnaby suddenly stood next to him.

The Sergeant looked at the DCI, then at his phone.

"The battery died.", he said with a surprised expression.

Barnaby nodded and said: "Well, it isn't the only thing, that is dead, now. Would you please-",

"Erm, excuse me, Sir, we were having a conversation!", Jessica said in an annoyed tone, her long fingers on his shoulder.

"No, we had just finished it. Sir, I'm coming."

"You aren't seriously leaving me because of him, again!", Jessica yelled and everyone waiting in line, looked at them curiously.

Before Jones could answer, Barnaby stepped close to her and whispered something, so only she could hear it.

Jessica first looked, like she wanted to argue back, but then she turned white and walked away fast, disappearing in the crowded streets.

"What did you tell her?"

"Just that we are needed at a crime scene. Jeffrey Gardner was found dead."

"Are you serious?"

~~~M~~~

Jeffreys body lay in the bathtub, although a toaster in his hands, he had a rather surpised expression.

His skin tone was blueish, maybe because of the cold water, but it might also be because of something else.

"Do you see the Tattoo?", Barnaby asked.

"Where? -Oh shit." He looked and looked away again. "There is no way, I can make this unseen again."

There was a Tattoo on a very private part of Jeffrey Gardner.

"Why would you put a Tattoo there?"

"Why not?"

Barnaby sighed and tried to have a closer look, without coming too close or even touching him.

" . + J.G. = 3"

"We don't often see something as tasteless as that.", Jones mumbled under his breath and walked over to the sink, pretending, like he admired the blue towels. There were beautiful roses on them.

"Now we have to find the person, he was so much in love with, that he put a Tattoo of her name ... over there."

"Or we don't. This one does look like a suicide quite a lot. Doesn't it?", he said, his back towards Barnaby, as he looked at a dark spot on one of the blue tiles.

"Why a toaster? Don't they usually use a hairdryer? And I think he looks rather surprised."

"Well, you are not wrong. It might be suspicious, that those people of a small group of friends are dying like flies on a windshield, Sir."

"I wouldn't have phrased it like that, but yes. Yes, it is.", Barnaby nodded and observed the little bottles of shampoos, conditioners and god-knows-what. There was a lot of it.

"What if Grace got jealous? She was his current girlfriend. Wasn't she?

And there it is. Another name." He gestured towards Jeffrey without looking in his direction.

"Maybe it isn't a name, but the shortform of something else..."

"No, that makes no sense."

"Where is his mobile?"

"I don't think, that they found one."

~~~M~~~

The chairs in the interrogation room back in Causton felt cold, when they sat down. This case seemed to take longer than usual.

"I need your undevided attention-", Barnaby began.

"You couldn't handle my undevided attention.", Elyas purred with a smirk.

"This is not a joke, Mr Sanchez.", Jones said, a tad too loudly.

Barnaby stood up and began to pace back and forth, doing his best to stay calm.

"If it really is one of us, at least now it's over.", Elyas said bitterly after a long moment of silence.

"Is this a confession?", Jones asked.

Elyas smiled mildly.

"How do you come to that conclusion?", Barnaby asked.

"If one of us kills the other one, only one of us is left. Then it is pretty obvious, who the killer is." Elyas rolled his eyes.

Grace just sobbed quietly. She bit on her fingernails. "And what if there is someone out there-"

"But you don't think there is someone. Don't you, Benny?"

"It's Sergeant Jones, Mr Sanchez.", the Sergeant spat.

"Whatever.", he said, rolling his eyes.

"You have nothing to hold us here.", Grace suddenly said and stood up, whiping the tears out of her eyes.

"Ms Myers. One of your friends is in the hospital, two are dead and one is still missing- Do you have any idea-"

"I'd like to talk to my lawyer, now.", Grace said in a low voice.

Elyas looked at her in surprise. Jones wasn't sure, if he had seen a flash of fear in his eyes.

"Sit down, please. Ms Meyers-"

"NOW.", she yelled.

The room seemed to get colder.

"What about you, Mr Sanchez?"

All eyes were on him. He hesitated.

"Well, I'm fine. Thank you. A cup of tea would be nice, though."

The detectives nodded and let the two left suspects alone.

After the door was closed, they started to whisper in angry hushed voices.

~~~M~~~

As it was much too often for Jones' taste the case, half an hour later, a lawyer seemingly materialized out of nowhere and ten minutes after that, the suspects were free to go.

"You've made a mistake, Jones.", Barnaby said.

Jones didn't even argue back.

It followed a long period of silence.

"Audrey might now be strong enough, so we can talk to her.", Barnaby suddenly said as he searched for the car keys.

When they got to the right hospital floor and saw, that no one was standing in front of the room, they ran the last few metres as fast as they could.

"What has happened here?"

On the bed laid Fredericks in handcuffs, wearing not more than one of his socks.

But luckily for him his most important bits were covered by the thin hospital blanket.

"What the hell happened here?"

"That's a bit hard to explain, Sir.", Fredericks said.

Jones started to chuckle, while Barnaby looked furious.

"To be fair, Sir. You didn't tell him, he wasn't allowed to let her out.", Jones said, not being able to suppress his laughter.

"What were you thinking?", Barnaby yelled.

Fredericks shrugged.

"When did she leave?"

Fredericks groaned. "I don't know."

And without further questions Barnaby stormed out of the room.

"Would you help me with the handcuffs, please?"

"Haha. No.", Jones said, before he turned and followed Barnaby.

"Hey. HEY!", Fredericks yelled after them.

~~~M~~~

"Do you know what it means?", Barnaby asked, waiting at the elevator.

"What?", Jones asked.

"We might have another suspect for the murder of Jeffrey Gardner."

He pushed the Button for down a few more times.

"If she could just have stayed in her damn room, she would have an alibi, now."

~~~M~~~

Even before they could ring the bell, Audrey opened the door.

"Thought you would come..."

Barnaby stared at her angrily: "Ms. Sanchez, you are supposed to-"

"I know. I know. But they wouldn't let me drink. -Come in and sit down.- Do you know the festival rule? If you don't stop drinking, you can't get a hangover. Oh, you sure want to know where I have been. Let me see... Ugh... After I left the old man at the hospital, I went to the grocery store, bought a sixpack and drank it in the parking lot. People will remember me, I believe." She grinned.

"We are going to check that. Anything else you want to talk about?"

"It's funny. The moment your shampoo says damage repair, but you are still broken on the inside.", Audrey said, crossing her arms and sitting back.

Jones was at a loss for words.

"I'd like to sleep a bit, before Ely and Grace come back. Would you leave me alone, please?"

"Ms Sanchez, you should really do something about your ...drinking problem."

For a moment it looked like she was going to get angry, but then she said quietly: "I know.", and shrugged, "I'm pathetic." She closed her eyes. "Total trash."

Barnaby and Jones left, silently.

~~~M~~~

"A new Blogpost is up.", Barnaby said.

"That is a damn lot of likes for a post about someone who was murdered."

"We should read that and all of the comments."

He scrolled down, very unhappy with that. "He labled it as a suicide. Isn't that something, we would have to decide?"

"Of course. But I'm sure, he already knows."

"We should-"

"We should wait and see.", Barnaby said and gave his Sergeant a warning look.

~~~M~~~

"We haven't considered it to be a hate crime yet.", Barnaby said out of nowhere, which made Jones, who had started to fall asleep, jump.

"A hate crime?"

"I'm referring to their ... lifestyle."

"We have seen other sorts of 'lifestyles'."

"Then have a look at that. It's a petition."

Jones looked over Barnabys shoulder at the computer screen.

"I see.", he said, and then he said nothing for a long time.

~~~M~~~

It was almost midnight, when Barnaby and Jones sat together, eating dinner and watching TV.

Then there was commercial break.

They had silently agreed, to not talk about the case in this night.

"Would you mind, if I asked, what happened between you and Jessica?"

Jones stared at him thoughtfully for a moment, then he said bluntly: "I came home from working late and caught her cheating on me with that one guy from the fire department."

Then they sat there avoiding to look in each others eyes for several seconds. They were in such a depressing mood, that even Sykes laid his head on his paws and winced quietly.

"Now you have to tell me, what happened to Sarah. Why... What happened?"

"No, I don't.", Barnaby answered, focussing on the TV-Screen once more.

And the only thing that followed, was an uncomfortable silence.

~~~M~~~

It was short after midnight when a taxi came to a hold under the still lit up livingroom window, where Grace and Elyas sat together, each one torturing the other with their silence.

Audrey had fallen asleep on the floor next to the sofa.

Until they couldn't take it anymore.

"No one ever asks me, how I feel.", Grace stated.

"How do you feel?", Elyas asked.

"If I were a bird, I would fly into a ceiling fan."

Elyas took a dramatically deep breath and said: "And I feel like that fairy skeleton meme. I'm dead inside, but I still want to cheer up other peoples lifes, so spread your wings, honey. I'll leave the window open."

Grace suddenly started to giggle hysterically and couldn't stop at the image of this, which woke up Audrey. She groaned and rolled to her side. "That meme sums you up so bloody well.", Grace said between snorts, "A skeleton in a fairy costume."

Suddenly the doorbell rang with an unpleasant shrieking.

It made Audrey cover her ears and Elyas muttered something remotely unfriendly before getting up to open the door.

As he did so, only seconds after that, he stumbled back in surprise, speechless.

He searched for words.

"Who is it?", Audrey yelled from the living room.

The person in front of Elyas stepped forward and out of the shadow. "Hey, girls, I'm back. Did you miss me?"

AN

A cliffhanger *yay* XD.

Ok, You can probably guess who it is.

Thank you for reading.

Pretty, pretty please let me know what you think and if you liked it.


	11. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

Jones woke up slowly, from the feeling, that his face was being licked.

He mumbled something along the lines of: "Not now ... Not in the car ... We are on duty, Si-"

Then he opened his eyes to a friendly dogface, very close to him, and a giggling Detective Chief Inspector, who seemed to have watched him for quite some time.

Jones shifted inelegantly and a bit embarrassed. He had the urge to clean his face, but he felt tired. Too tired to stand up. So he stayed where he was, shoving the dog aside, before cleaning his face with his pyjamas' sleeve.

Sykes huffed and went back to Barnaby, who knelt down beside the dog, to pet him.

"Do you often randomly stand there and watch me sleep?", the Sergeant groaned.

"No, most times I sit."

A pause.

Jones sighed.

"A joke. I get it. Don't do that again. It's freaking me out."

"Really?"

"Really."

"Well, then quickly get yourself dressed. It's your turn to make breakfast and Sykes and I are hungry.", Barnaby stated and then turned to leave.

Approximately half an hour later, they sat at the breakfast table, staring at the plates in front of them.

"You had one job and you failed miserably.", Barnaby said under his breath while scratching at the burnt spots on his toast.

"Seems like I'm not worthy of the honour to cook for you, Sir."

"I see what you are trying to do there and it isn't working. I'm going to teach you how to cook, starting next week. First lesson: We'll be trying toast again."

Jones rolled his eyes, but smirked anyway.

"Seriously. I don't know, how you survived for so long."

"I was distracted, because one of Jessica's friends called and wanted to ask something about Elyas."

"What did they ask?"

"I don't know. I hung up." Jones shrugged.

Barnaby looked disappointed.

"Do you want me to call her back and ask, Sir?" He sighed.

"It might be something helpful."

"Fine. I'll call Vanessa. Wait a minute."

He stood up and left the room to call her, while Barnaby washed the dishes.

Sykes sat down, watching both of them carefully, waiting for a treat.

When Jones came back, he looked annoyed.

"What did she say?", the DCI asked.

"She wanted to know, what his hair smells like and if I could get her some."

"That's ...alarming."

"It is. I'll delete her number."

~~~M~~~

Grace had tears smeared all over her face, as she stumbled across the garden path.

There was the sound of footsteps and heavy breathing behind her.

The young woman held her bag close to her chest, as she fumbled for her phone.

The sound of footsteps came closer. Then they stopped.

She turned around.

Nothing.

Then she started to run.

~~~M~~~

Jones had been sent to a small supermarket in Badgers Drift to get fresh tomatoes, cheese and a few other items, so Barnaby could cook dinner for them in the evening again.

When he grabbed for the last box of chocolate crunchy cornflakes (which were limited edition, because they were sheep-shaped), a woman, that suddenly stood next to him, reached for the same box and their cold fingers met.

"Sorry, you were first. You can have them.", the woman stuttered quickly and stepped back.

"It's ok you can have them. You were first, I guess.", he handed her the box.

"No, I wasn't. You should take them." She shoved the box back in his direction.

"Yes, you were, but thank you." he smiled shyly and took the cornflakes.

"Ok. Give them back. I'll take them.", she suddenly said and grabbed the box once more.

Jones let it go with a confused expression "I'm sorry, but have I seen you before?", he asked the woman. Her smile faded ever so slightly.

The Sergeant took a closer look at her.

She had a lemon green jacket, and a scarf and a hat of the same colour, brown eyes and a pale face. Sickly pale.

He couldn't put the finger on it, where he had seen her before.

"I don't think I know you. You know what? This isn't fair- and I am a fair person. In exchange for the cornflakes I'll give you my number. But now I have to go back to a family reunion. Please, excuse me.", the woman said.

Jones stared startled at the small piece of paper in his hand: "Wait! What's your name?"

"Peggy. Peggy McPherson.", she said and turned around again.

"McPherson?"

But the woman had already disappeared between the aisles.

He looked around, but then he shrugged it off and quickly went to get the remaining items on the shopping list Barnaby had given to him in the morning.

~~~M~~~

"What took you so long? Lunch break was over ten minutes ago. Did you get the cheddar?", Barnaby asked, when Jones entered the office.

"Yes, it's even -. ... Listen: there was a girl, that gave me her number... That was kinda strange..."

Jones shrugged again and put the bag he was carrying down.

Barnaby laughed.

"What's so funny?", Jones asked.

"Nothing. I mean, look at us!"

"What is it?"

This moment the phone rang.

They looked at each other.

Then at the phone again.

"Grace or Elyas?", Jones asked and hesitated.

"My money is on Elyas."

"I think it's Grace.", he said and answered the call, "This is- ... Yes ... No ... No ... ...NO ... Ok ... ... Ok ... Bye."

Barnaby looked at him questioningly.

"It was Jessica, Sir."

"What did she want?"

"She wanted to talk to you."

"Why did you hang up?"

Jones crossed his arms and . "Do you have something to tell me, Sir?"

"Nothing that I know of, please excuse me." He avoided to look at him, as he escaped the room, trying hard to not do so as quickly, as he actually wanted.

~~~M~~~

After Barnaby had left, Jones took some time to just sit there and think.

Although he would never admit it, he wasn't very good at multitasking, so instead of continuing this one funny game he had on his phone, he grimaced and tried to make sense of all the things that had happened in the last two weeks.

So he took his notebook and started to scribble things down.

-First there was Walter Falk, who was missing. ...Does he even exist? His friends don't seem to be very good friends, because they probably either killed him or made him run away. There were no parents or other guardians to be found. Poor sod.

-Then there was Claudia Morsten, who died in an accident -or not an accident. It once again let the group of friends not appear very ... good?.

Her mother had been furious, because Elyas had somehow managed to phone her before the detectives had a chance to talk to her.

-Then there was Jeffrey Gardner, who died in a bath tub and had a tattoo on a very …particular place. That looked much less like an accident. But let's try not to think about the tattoo too much. It might be meaningless after all.

-Then there were these videos, which were so terrible that they weren't even funny anymore. It would be really bad if Barnaby insisted that they watched them again.

-Then there was Jessica, who lied and Barnaby behaved strange around her. Why would he act like that? Why did he leave the office? Had he went to meet her? If yes, then why?

-Then there was this annoying bastard Elyas who tried to hit on Barnaby.

(The last thing made him clench his teeth.)

-Were there several cases or were they intertwined like a ... a ... a sock ... made by grandma?

He stared at his monitor without really looking.

Maybe half an hour later Barnaby came back and quietly sat down.

Jones wanted to ask where he went to. But he decided against it after one look at his stern face.

~~~M~~~

Audrey and Elyas were terribly failing at making Spaghetti, when they bumped into each other and Audrey almost spilled the half boiling water over herself, while Elyas almost dropped his phone into the pot.

"Enough.", Audrey said. "Put your damn phone away."

"No."

"Give it to me so I can shove it up your-"

"Honey, calm down."

"You are looking at those pictures again. Aren't you?"

"Maybe…"

"That's disgusting." She crinkled her nose and let go of him, when he bit into her arm.

"I've seen worse things."

"I can only imagine.", she said sarcastically, "Just let him never find out, that you took pictures of him."

"Did you see his tie, he wore on Wednesday, honey? It made his eyes look so much more-"

"What about Bill?"

"No." Elyas turned away dramatically.

"He has a good heart."

"Thanks. I don't need a transplant."

And with that he took two bowls of half crunchy spaghetti and left the kitchen, to join the person waiting for him in the living room.

~~~ M~~~

After some hours of going through paperwork, they lean to their desk next to each other and stared at the board.

There were pictures of the suspects, victims and a half-heartedly attempt of a timeline.

Suddenly something in Jones' head made a soundless 'Click'.

" . -Peggy McPherson! There was that one girl I met at the supermarket.", Jones suddenly yelled.

"The sl- girl, that gave you her number? So she was that special someone of Jeffrey Gardner?"

"I mean how high are the chances? Right?"

" . sounds quite unique. Doesn't it?"

The Sergeant went to the board and took a photo in his hands.

"And I just realised something else!", he exclaimed.

"What is it?"

"That ... that is the woman I met.", Jones said and pointed at the photo of Elyas' and Audreys sister in Paris.

At that very moment the phone started ringing again.

"Hello? ... Yes, on the phone ... Alright ... Jones and I will be there at six."

"Sir?"

"We are invited for dinner...", the DCI said, without looking at him.

"I would almost assume that he would...appreciate it, if you came alone, so he could... No offence.", Jones stuttered while sitting down again.

"None taken." You could see, that he was lying. "How is he still trying to play games, when he is a prime suspect in a murder investigation?" He shook his head.

"But his sister is now our number one suspect. Isn't she?"

"He doesn't know that. And anyway, just because Mr. Gardner had that tatoo, doesn't mean, that his lover is the killer."

"But- wait, Sir. Is the sister married?"

"Why?"

"Because of her last name."

"Let's search for 'McPherson'"

Jones' fingers flew over the keyboard, while Barnaby leaned over his shoulder uncomfortably close, which made him maybe a tiny bit nervous..

"Jones, you missspelled-"

"I KNOW. I know. ...sorry."

He did some more typing, clicking and scrolling.

And then he finally said: "There it is:

Peggy McPherson, 24 ...minor theft...ok …

And this leads us to…

Petra McPherson, 36 she was driving while drunk...

Phineas McPherson, 27...he got into trouble because of ….stalking!?"

And then they said nothing for a while, concentrating on reading the reports. There were a few of them.

"Their parents seem to have a strange sense of humour.", Jones finally said.

"You know, what is worse?", Barnaby asked.

"That stalking-thing is pretty- I mean – we should be very careful with them –You-"

But Barnaby interrupted him: "They have the same initials."

They went quiet for ten minutes, rereading the police reports, until Jones said: "If my name were Phineas McPherson, I would be completely destroyed. Surely he was bullied in school."

"And more importantly, you would tell no one."

They shared a knowing look.

"Let's not let them know, what we know."

~~~M~~~

"Did you drink the last beer?", Audrey asked.

"No, I didn't.", Peggy answered. She had been looking out of the living room's window, until her sister had disturbed the silence so rudely.

"Maybe I did... I can't remember." Audrey chewed her nails, while standing next to her sister who was still watching a blackbird, rather unimpressed.

"Don't you think, you should slow down at least a bit, honey?", Elyas asked from the other corner of the room, where he was arranging the shelves differently. There were some old books, which had been there before them.

"I'm here for a good time, not a long time.", Audrey said and made her way back to the kitchen.

"Why do you not talk to her?", he asked, when his older sister had left the room. "She won't listen to me, but with you it might be different. "

"You heard her, …", Peggy answered. She was too indifferent to even shrug.

Elyas opened his mouth to say something, but then decided against it and kept staring holes in his sisters back instead.

She still stood with her back towards him, when she asked: "When can I use the guest bathroom again?"

"Well, sorry for the inconvenience, but our friend died there. What is wrong with the main bathroom?"

"It doesn't have a mirror and Aud always leaves her dirty underwear on the floor."

"If you want to check your makeup, you can always take a selfie. Like I do.", Elyas said with a confident grin. In that moment the blackbird flew away.

Peggy sighed. "I know, that you do that. You post that selfies on every existing social media platform."

"I know, my Selfies always look great." Elyas winked.

"They are the reason I unfollowed you.", his sister replied dryly.

"You unfollowed me?"

"I'm going for a walk now. Bye.", she sighed for the probably hundredth time on this day, while she left the room quickly reaching for her coat.

"I DIDN'T KNOW, YOU UNFOLLOWED ME."

But she was already out the door.

~~~M~~~

Time kept flying and soon it was afternoon and with that time for dinner.

Barnaby and Jones stood in front of the cottage, neither of them really willing to ring the bell.

Suddenly Elyas/Phineas opened the door.

"I knew I heard a car. Do come in- are you hungry? Well hopefully. My sisters Audrey and Peggy are in the dining room. Have you met Peggy yet? We made fish and chips. Chips is like the only thing Aud likes to eat. Grace isn't here by the way- I don't know where she is, but she might be fine. I guess. She updates her statuses every few hours on face book and twitter. ...We have all sorts of drinks. Which would you like? Please, sit down."

Meanwhile they had arrived in the dining room.

Audrey/Petra and Peggy brought the food and they all sat down together, while Peggy and Jones avoided looking at each other.

They ate in silence everyone carefully watching each other.

"We are here for some reason. Aren't we?", Jones carefully asked.

Audrey nodded and said: "We hate to break it to you, but we did your job better than you. We went on Walters Facebook page again and saw that he changed his status to 'fmoneyandgetbitchez' -he's now in Southampton with his auntie Rose. He's fine."

"We are going to check that.", Jones said.

"So, where have you spend the last few weeks,...Peggy?"

"In London?"

"Would you be so kind to get more precise?", Barnaby asked.

"I was in London busy having cancer."

Jones and Barnaby were startled, while Peggy still looked very indifferent.

Elyas cleared his throat, but before he could say anything, Audrey cut him off: "Oh, shut up."

"And are you …better?", Jones stuttered.

Barnaby shot him a glance that basically said something like _Get_ _your_ _feet_ _out_ _of_ _your_ _mouth_.

"No.", Peggy answered.

"She decided, to ignore it. But we are not encouraging her behaviour. We'll find a better doctor and we'll do something certain alcoholics-"

"It's none of your business.", Peggy and Audrey said in unison.

Desperate to change the subject, Jones asked: "Sooo, what are your parents doing?"

"Oh, this and that.", Audrey said.

"Mum is a photographer and dad is a model.", Peggy said.

"Really?", Jones asked.

"Yeah. Now take a guess how they met.", Elyas said.

"They met in college, when they studied Law.", Peggy said and rolled her eyes.

"We've travelled so much when we were younger. That was nice. Now they are travelling alone. But we get postcards every now and then.", Elyas beamed.

"It's their fault we didn't learn anything at school properly. Everything I know, I learned from watching TV.", Peggy said.

"We used to move so damn often. Had no time to find real friends and stuff", Audrey said.

"But we always have each other.", Elyas said cheerfully.

Barnaby looked at the siblings and then at Jones.

Audrey stared in her drink melancholy. Her plate already was empty.

Peggy coughed something in her serviette and then expected it , before fishing some tiny pills out of her pockets and then swallowing them without water.

Jones was just pushing his food around on his plate, not able to hide his slightly disgusted expression.

It wasn't even ten o'clock, when Barnaby decided that their conversations weren't going anywhere and left with Jones.

"But you could stay the night.", Elyas had said.

"Yeah. Without Walter, Jeffrey, Claudia and Grace we have two spare guestrooms.", Audrey had said under her breath.

~~~M~~~

 _Clickclickclick_

The DCI played with his pen, which annoyed his Sergeant. The office was almost empty.

He finally said :"I don't think Peggy did it - did anything, Sir."

"Isn't it somehow discriminating, to say that, just because of her … health condition?", Barnaby asked.

He shrugged. The clicking sound continued, faster than before.

"I don't see a valid motive. Plus we don't know how much time she has left, Sir."

"She could have the same motives as any other person."

They glared at each other for another moment.

"I'm just saying, that it might be considered discrimination, if we-"

"Why in the world are you so..."

"So... What?"

"Bitter? Pessimistic? Negative?"

"Why aren't you? This case is driving me mad, Jones.", he answered slowly. "Do you think it is fun for me to-"

"Yes, I actually do. You enjoy every second of it. Don't you? A puzzle, you can't solve. You love it." Jones realised, that he had been yelling.

Barnaby didn't answer, because it reminded him of something. He let his pen fall to the table.

"What is it? Sir?", Jones asked, trying to read his expression.

"No it's nothing. We are stuck I can't see where we are going, this is -have you checked on Walter Falk?", he suddenly interrupted himself.

"Yeah. He changed that status-thingie. He's probably fine."

"Is it possible, that anyone other than him did that?"

"You would need his password."

"Let's try, if we can find it.", Barnaby said and rolled his chair over next to Jones.

"Sure. 123456." *click* "it doesn't work. I give up.", Jones said and leaned back in his chair.

"No, we don't. Try 000000."

 _*click*_ Jones shook his head.

"His birth date."

"I don't think we have that."

"Try 'Audrey'."

 _*click*_

They looked at each other in surprise. "It worked."

~~~M~~~

Audrey came into the living room and said: "We really should clean up a little or at least do the dishes. I just had to eat my yoghurt with my bare hands."

"Whatever.", Elyas mumbled and changed his position on the couch, so he was now looking at the ceiling. His phone laid on his stomach. He had been working on his article about Barnaby, until he got distracted and put a slideshow of photos of his friends together. He sighed whole-heartedly. So did Audrey.

"Are you ok?", she asked quietly.

He muttered something along the lines "No. Wubbalubbadubdub, I guess." under his breath.

"Can I help you?" She shoved him to the side and sat down next to him.

"Well, I messed up quite a bit. Didn't I?"

"You think so?"

"This whole thing is just snowballing and I can't stop thinking of you know who and I'm embarrassing myself and now even one of my nails is broken." He bit on his nails as a single tear rolled down his cheek.

"If you think these are good reasons to feel bad, then hold my beer."

"You think you can get into more trouble than I am already in? That's impossible. More people are ... gonna get hurt and-"

"Challenge accepted." She raised her glass solemnly, which made him grin.

"You know, that I love you ...like a sister?", he asked dramatically, as he wiped the tear away.

"Well, every day you feel more like a brother to me.", she answered equally dramatic, before they cracked up giggling.

"Wait a minute. We just had dinner with our detective friends and you were still hungry?"

"You know that I fancy my nice old midnight yoghurt."

"It feels like every time we talk, you are eating or at least preparing food…", Elyas mused.

Before Audrey could answer something remotely unfriendly, the doorbell rang again and Elyas went to answer it.

He opened the door and a girl with a bright red fan shirt stood in front of him. He stared for a moment at his own face covering the stomach of the girl.

"Who is it?", Audrey yelled from the living room.

"Hello, I'm Vanessa and I'd really, really, really like to have an autograph. Please?",

Elyas looked at her more carefully for a long moment. She had curly black hair, dark skin and the brightest smile, and most expressive eyes he had ever seen. She looked at him expectantly and with very much hope in her dark eyes.

Then he shrugged and gestured inside.

"Sure come in."

"Oh. My. God. Thank you!" She bounced up and down, happily. "Thank you so much!"

Then she stormed inside.

~~~M~~~

"We can't know if they have figured it out as well.", Jones said.

"And if they did so, we can't know, who did it."

They sighed, as they looked at the clock on the wall at the same moment.

"It has gotten late. Would you like to go home or just stay here and wait until the new shift begins?", Barnaby asked dryly.

"That depends on if you still want to cook for me, Sir."

"We had dinner only a few hours ago.", Barnaby said, while tidying his desk a bit.

"You call that dinner?"

"Wait another few hours and I'll make breakfast."

"Fine. But I'm hoping for bacon and scrambled eggs."

~~~M~~~

"I have so many questions for you.", Vanessa said.

"I have one as well: What are you up to, this late? People are normally not allowed to talk to me after I had my midnight yoghurt."

"Well. My best friend said, that her Exboyfriend knows you. So I followed him and the his partner around and …and …and I've been waiting in front of the house and uhh.." She blushed.

"What did you want to ask us?", Elyas asked in a much friendlier tone than his sister.

She breathed heavily: "I'm too excited, I don't even know, what to say… Do you have any advice for me? I mean general life-advice?"

"Follow your dreams.", Elyas said solemnly.

"I know another one: Don't ever claim that you can party hard, if you haven't had to be rescued from the kiddies' pool, while drunk.", Audrey said dryly.

"The third time was totally on purpose.", Elyas said while gesturing wildly.

"The cute pool attendant. I know."

They giggled childishly.

"I ship you so hard.", Vanessa said so quietly, that the siblings didn't even hear her, because they were still bantering

"So why are you really here?", Audrey finally asked the girl.

Vanessa smiled.

~~~M~~~

 **Author's note**

Thank you for reading!

Please, let me know what you think.

Constructive criticism is always welcome.

Tell me, if you like my story, tell me, if you like my OCs, tell me, how many people you think are still going to die.

Tell me, if you have any ideas on how to improve my English. I- apologize for any mistakes. It's my third language after all.

You may –if you like to- also follow me on tumblr (look for abirdonalilactree), if you like being spammed with memes, cute animal pics, more memes, gifsets (I watch too many TV shows) and the occasional writing stuff. (and if we like the same things, I'll most likely follow back.)

Also feel free to message me, if you wish to discuss my story, Midsomer Murders or crime series in general : )

Thanks again and have a good day/night.


	12. Chapter 8

**Author's note**

Thanks for your patience :)

Here comes the next chapter

~~~M~~~

"Pssst, Aud, wake up!", Elyas whispered, as he slowly pulled his sisters blanket away, which almost made her fall out of her bed.

"I don't know, how to get rid of Vanessa.", Elyas said quietly. Audrey opened her eyes a bit and closed them again. Her brothers' bathrobe had a bright pink colour, which made Audrey feel like, it was hurting her eyes.

"Who?", she asked, and rubbed her eyes.

"That Girl, that came to visit us last night. You remember?"

"ugh… sure…"

"She won't leave the house, Aud, I don't know, what to do."

"Is she still here?", Audrey asked as she stretched her arms and yawned loudly.

"I don't know how to kick her out again.", Elyas whispered.

"I'll show you how.", Audrey said, as she stood up, surprisingly fast and stormed into the living room.

"GET OUT OF HERE!", she suddenly yelled, and clapped her hands, like she wanted to scare a chicken or something.

Vanessa jumped off the sofa, shocked.

"I-"

"Get out of here! I won't repeat myself.", she yelled, took a pillow from the sofa and threw it towards their guest.

With tears in her eyes, Vanessa fled.

"Was that really necessary?", Elyas asked, quietly.

"'Thought, you didn't know what else to do." She crossed her arms.

"You're being rude, honey.", Elyas said in a tired voice.

~~~M~~~

Sykes jumped onto a chair and from there onto the kitchen counter to have a better view out of the window.

At that moment Barnaby and Jones were getting into the car. It started to rain. Sykes saw, that Jones said something and Barnaby laughed. It was nice to see his master happy. The dog wagged its tail.

Sykes hasn't been able yet to show the DCI, what he had smelled on that one special burnt tree so many days ago. Their connection wasn't very good at the moment. His master seemed to be occupied by something else.

But it was fine. Sooner or later they were going to walk this path again. Maybe when the rain had stopped for a bit and the soil had some time to dry. The Inspector always complained about getting his shoes dirty.

Something behind his left ear told the dog, that he shouldn't give up trying to show Barnaby, what he saw. Maybe it was some kind of higher self-awareness or it was a talking flea. Who knows?

He sat down, still looking out of the window.

Then he stood up again and barked at a squirrel.

~~~M~~~

"Girls, I'm afraid, I have to tell you something.", Peggy said in a low voice.

Elyas crossed his arms and Audrey poured herself another drink, while Peggy fumbled for another cigarette.

"Honey, you've had enough. Sweetheart, please stop with that-"

"You are not our mom.", Audrey said and held a hand protectively over her drink.

"Someone has to take care of you idiots.", he said and sighed.

"Where is Grace?", Peggy asked.

"Packed her things and left."

He smacked the cigarette out of her hand with a quick move.

"Where did she go?"

"'Far, far away', she said, when I asked.", Audrey said, before she made a noise, that was something between a yawn and a snort, while Peggy took another cigarette out of a small box.

"Our lovely detectives won't like that.", Elyas said flatly.

Peggy went to the window, opened it and lit up the cigarette. "Hey, there is someone outside watching us.", she said.

"Is it Grace?"

"No."

Audrey and Elyas stood up from the couch.

"F*** get down!", Peggy suddenly yelled.

They all let themselves fall to the floor, when a stone flew through the opened window and onto the table, shattering their glasses and spilling a mixture of vodka and mango juice.

The next stone shattered a picture of an ugly flower. And the last stone almost hit Audrey, when she moved to reach for a piece of glass.

For the next minutes, no one moved.

"Is it gone?", Peggy finally asked quietly.

"Yes, he or she is gone.", Elyas said, who had carefully crept close to the window.

"I so hate Mondays.", Peggy said, as she stood up and straightened her wig.

"Everyone hates Mondays.", Audrey mumbled. She had spilled her drink all over her trousers. Then she reached for one of the broken bottles. "I'm going out there."

~~~M~~~

"Look! There is someone!", Jones whispered, when they approached the cottage.

A hooded figure disappeared between the trees, before they could come close.

Barnabys phone rang the moment he knocked on the door.

"Wow, that was fast.", Elyas said, as he opened the door.

"Did something happen?"

"I didn't get hurt, thanks for asking. But someone in a black cape was out there and-well-"

"I'll get that bitch.", Audrey yelled from somewhere behind the house.

"I don't think, that this is even the right direction.", they heard Peggy yell from somewhere above, probably from a window.

~~~M~~~

After Audrey had calmed down, and they had cleaned up the living room a bit, they sat down.

"How drunk are you?", Jones asked with disgust, when Audrey could barely fill her glass, because her hands were shaking too much.

"That's none of our business, Jones.", Barnaby said with a side-glance.

"I love that you are defending us.", Elyas said, smirking.

"I love being defended.", Peggy giggled.

"I love how you think we have the need to be defended.", Audrey grumbled, rolling her eyes sarcastically.

"Do you know which one of your enemies did this?", Jones asked and gestured vaguely towards the floor.

"I think we pissed off Vanessa a bit. Maybe.", Elyas said, his voice slightly accusing. His sister ignored him.

"What about Ms. Myers?", Barnaby asked.

"It wasn't Grace.", Peggy said.

"How can you be so sure?", Jones asked.

She just shrugged.

"Wait… Vanessa who?"

"I don't know her full name."

"Dark hair, skin and eyes, a bit squealy and annoying?"

"Yeah sounds like her."

"Is that…", Barnaby asked quietly and Jones nodded.

"We'll talk to her. She might be a stalker.", the Sergeant said.

"Oh, so you know her?", Peggy asked.

Jones looked away, unwilling to answer.

"You should be careful with that kind of people."

"I already used to have a stalker-problem.", Elyas said dramatically.

"Could you elaborate that?", Barnaby asked.

"Would you be jealous if I did?", Elyas asked, grinning.

Jones stood up, but the DCI pulled him back down next to him.

"How cute.", Audrey snorted sarcastically.

"We need the name, Mr Sanchez, if you want us to prevent future murders.", Barnaby said calmly.

"This was all a long time ago.", Elyas said melancholy.

"A long time ago? How old are you? 24? You don't even know, what a long time is.", Jones said under his breath.

Elyas just smiled.

"You know what?", Peggy suddenly exclaimed, "I'll bring you to your car. These were enough questions unanswered for today don't you think? We are very busy mourning our dead friends, can't you see?"

Barnaby stared at her, but then he nodded.

~~~M~~~

Three minutes later, they stood in front of their car. But they hesitated to get in The young woman crossed her arms.

"Bill is not looking for us. There used to be a 'stalker-problem', but it wasn't him. ...it ...Elyas was the problem. He was just being scary for quite a bit."

What is his full name? Where does he live?", Jones asked.

"William Stone. He lives in Finchmere. It's not that far from here I think."

"Thank you, Ms McPherson."

"You are welcome. …But.. inspector? He's not the one. I'm sure it was a woman. Something about the way she moved was so familiar."

"There is something you aren't telling us. Isn't there?"

"Well…"

"You should tell us."

"It's ridiculous."

"What is it?"

She sighed sadly. "For a moment… For a short moment I thought it was Claudia. But that can't be. Can it?"

The detectives hesitated to answer.

Peggy wiped a tear away angrily. "She is dead. Isn't she? They said, they saw her die."

"Yes, Ms McPherson. Thank you for your time. We will keep in touch."

They got in the car, closed the doors and Barnaby started driving. They watched her in the cars' mirror until she disappeared. She looked very lost.

"Do you not find that ... a bit ... concerning?"

"What exactly are you referring to, Jones?"

He hesitated. "Everything?"

"Yes, it is. Very concerning."

~~~M~~~

"The groupchat is getting emptier...", Audrey said, eyes fixed on her motionless phone.

"You usually don't even write anything.", Elyas reminded her.

"But I kinda like the drama.", she sighed.

Peggy coughed.

"Want a mint bonbon?", Elyas asked.

Peggy shook her head and continued to focus on her phone.

"There was something you wanted to tell us. Wasn't there?"

"Ugh. It's nothing."

"What is it?"

Peggy sighed. "Nothing. Really. I am going for a walk now."

They watched their sister leave the house, before they concentrated on their phones again.

~~~M~~~

The detectives were in their office again, staring at the board silently until suddenly and out of nowhere Jones asked: "Sir, we are friends, aren't we?"

"Yes, we are. Sure. Why are you asking that?", Barnaby asked, quite confused.

"I have the feeling, that you are hiding something, Sir."

"What makes you think that?"

Jones just shrugged.

"Everything is fine. And believe me, you are…" He stopped. Then he seemed to remember something and Jones saw his expression change.

The Sergeant nodded and the DCI stood up from his desk and reached for his jacket.

They both looked equally disappointed in different directions.

"Can you have a word with Vanessa on your own? I still have a few things to do. I have to .run some errands.", Barnaby asked.

"Sure.", Ben said reluctantly and went, but not before watching Barnaby go.

~~~M~~~

"Are you stalking me?"

Jones jumped at the voice that came suddenly from behind him.

"No?"

"Is that a question, Sergeant Jones?"

"You scared me."

"Sorry."

"What are you doing here?", he asked.

"I'm checking up on Vanessa. I feel a bit sorry for her.", Peggy said.

They stood in front of the house, where Vanessa lived. The garden looked a bit …unloved. The grass was high and the wooden fence was half broken.

"Why? It would be safer for you and your siblings if you don't interact with that kind of people."

"I'm fine. Thanks for your concern. I don't have much to lose right now.", she smiled genuinely.

Ben hesitated to answer, when he understood what she was referring to. Wishing to make her feel safe, so he maybe could get finally some important information out of her, he decided to change the topic.

"I wondered why you didn't choose a pseudonym, like your siblings…"

"'Peggy' is a wonderful name, what are you talking about?"

Jones was flabbergasted, by the annoyance and fury in her voice. But then she cracked up laughing.

"Nah, I hate it. But I couldn't think of a better one. All the other names I could ever think of and weren't already taken sounded silly. I haven't found a name that suited me, yet. But it is our parents' fault. Really. …That we never fit in."

"I don't understand how parents can do this to their children."

"Oh. Stupid names are a family tradition. Dad's name is Patrick McPherson and mom,... mom's called Pamela Parkinson."

He cringed. Then he laughed.

They both laughed.

"That's stupid. –sorry."

"I didn't say it wasn't."

"Pamela Parkinson..."

Jones giggled. "That is an awesome name."

"You think so?"

"Yes. All these names are- what's it called? Alliterations?"

"Yeah. Funny story. She kept it, when she became a photographer. Most people think it is a pseudonym. And she thinks that is hilarious."

"Well, it is." She smiled friendly.

He sighed and looked at his watch. Then he got serious again. "I should talk to Vanessa, now. And you should go home."

"But-" Her face dropped.

"Believe me. It is better if I talk to her alone. Go home. …And be safe. Ok?"

"I just-"

"Good bye." He smiled friendly and walked away, towards the house.

"Sometimes it feels like I'm only talking to myself.", Peggy murmured and then left, after watching the sergeant enter the house.

~~~M~~~

Vanessa opened the door and let him in. She wore black leggings and a black plain shirt.

Jones waited at the kitchen table, while she made tea. He listened to the noises her bare feet made on the floor, while he waited for her to start talking.

"What happened over there?", He finally asked.

" .Nothing."

He had never been to her house before, but he had some kind of image in his head, which compelled him to make a wild guess. "Where are your posters?"

She froze. " I threw them away. They were kind of silly anyway."

Jones nodded. But he was assuming that if he went upstairs, he would find a shrine or something equally disturbing. For a moment he was wondering, what he was even doing there. Should he ask to use the bathroom and then 'get lost' completely unintentionally, of course.

"Where were you this morning?"

"Nowhere."

"Vanessa.."

"Listen. I got kicked out by Audrey. Then I went to the store, bought five pounds of ice cream and then came back here."

"Could you show me the receipt?"

"Yeah it is in the box next to the table."

He reached for the box and looked at the small pieces of paper on top of it.

"Oh. Well. Thank you. I think I have to go now." He stared at the small piece of paper. Five pounds of ice cream. At exactly the time, the incident had happened.

"Wait. Why did you come here in the first place? Did something happen? Is Elyas ok? Oh my god! What did happen?"

"He is fine. Calm down, please."

She breathed heavily, already hyperventilating.

Jones stood up, his cup of tea still untouched. "Listen, I have to go now, someone is calling me."

And he left the very concerned girl behind.

Before he got back into the car, he acted like he was phoning someone. He felt, how she was watching him. Then he drove away as fast as he could. Well, as fast as was legally allowed.

~~~M~~~

The McPherson-siblings sat in front of the mute TV flickering nervously, all staring down on their phones.

"Who are you texting?", Elyas asked nervously, after he had watched his older sister for a few minutes. He didn't like that kind of smile on her face.

"Fred."

"Who?"

Audrey rolled her eyes. "From the hospital."

"I thought the cute doctors' name was Martin?"

"It's not the doctor."

"Ok. Wouldn't believe you would go for a nine."

Then suddenly he started laughing. "Wait a minute. …Really? The old, fat guy?"

"He keeps texting me- I kinda like the old man.", she smiled softly.

"He's a three. Or a two. …You dropped something, honey."

"What?" She looked confused to the floor.

"Your standards."

"Fred says he loves me and he will run away with me." She pouted, as she crossed her arms.

"You are garbage, Aud.", Elyas said, then he left his sisters alone.

"Don't let that ever stop you.", Peggy whispered loudly and grinned, "It's called garbage can and not garbage can't!"

"Why are you on her side?", Elyas yelled from the kitchen.

~~~M~~~

After they met at the office again, Jones told the DCI everything he had found out and they drove to Finchmere in silence. Barnaby refused to tell, were he went, when Jones interviewed the suspects and Jones felt mortally offended by the whole situation.

But soon they stood in front of a small inconspicuous looking house.

A young man opened the door. He had short brown hair, brown eyes, and boring grey clothes and all in all looked very mediocre.

"I am Detective Chief Inspector John Barnaby and this is Detective Sergeant Ben Jones. From Causton CID. We are here because we have a few questions concerning Elyas Sanchez or Phineas McPherson, depending on under which name you came to know him."

"Come in.", the young man said, sounding surprisingly relieved. "Please, have a seat. I have something to show you."

The detectives looked around in the living room, while the young man was away to get something seemingly important.

The walls were white, no pictures, a vase with dried flowers, a bookshelf with a few biographies of people they had never heard of. And then they heard the steps coming closer again and quickly sat back down on the couch.

"This is so embarrassing, but here you have it, Mr…Inspector."

Bill handed him his old phone.

"I couldn't quite bring myself to throw it away.", Bill said quietly. "Phineas was …something."

The detectives exchanged a look.

"He did something to my phone, so I couldn't block him. –I just stopped answering and tried to ignore this shit load of messages."

Jones took the phone from Barnaby and scrolled through the messages.

" _Run away with me now.-P"_

" _This is not the right time. …Phineas, I just can't.–B"_

" _What are you waiting for?-P"_

" _Are you afraid of me now?-P"_

" _Don't you feel it?-P"_

" _Let's have an adventure.-P"_

…

" _Don't leave me.-P"_

" _Never leave me.-P"_

" _Honest to god I will break your heart.-P"_

" _I don't care, if heaven won't take me back.-P"_

" _This is who I really am inside. Believe.-P"_

" _I will tear you to pieces and rip you apart.-P"_

" _And I can't escape myself.-P"_

" _So what if you can see the darker side of me?-P"_

… _._

" _Look in my eyes; you are killing me.-P"_

" _I don't think I need you anymore, take the hurt and the pain I don't need it.-P"_

They looked up from the phone.

"His sister was the real problem, I think.", Bill said, eyes fixed on the floor.

"Peggy?", Jones asked.

"No, Petra."

"What did she do?"

"I don't know, what was happening in her head. But she had this strange fixation. And …she pressured us somehow. And I'm not sure if she was just crazy, or…I don't know." He shook his head and then covered his eyes tiredly.

"What happened?", Ben asked softly.

Bill shook his head once more. He looked, like something was hurting him from the inside. "I really don't want to talk about it. At least now it is over. I had left it behind me. Started new. I don't want to remember. Don't make me go back there, please. It is a very dark place to be."

They kept talking to Bill, but there wasn't much else to get out of him.

It was in the middle of the night, when the DCI and his Sergeant drove back home.

~~~M~~~

 **Author's note**

Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but someday, one of you, guys, has to make an in-depth analysis of this.

Seriously, I'm hiding so many easter eggs in my stories…

Visit me on tumblr, if you like to talk, or just quietly watch me reblog cute animal pics, memes and writing stuff or somthin'.

Anyway tell me what you think so far, thanks for reading and have a great day/night!


	13. Chapter 9

**Author's note**

This is the last chapter of this fic.

Thank you so much to all of you, who came back to read this.

Thank you for the messages and reviews, they mean so much to me! :)

~~~M~~~

 _ **Rainbow**_

Sykes had been sleeping on his masters' stomach, when Barnaby started to stir. It wasn't very comfortable, but he liked it anyway. Until the DCI woke up and sat him back on the floor.

The dog looked disapprovingly at Barnaby. But his masters' eyes were locked with the Sergeants' who had just entered the room.

The humans talked to each other.

Sykes stretched his back and then went to the kitchen, where it smelled like breakfast. He straight up ignored the bowl of dogfood that Jones already had prepared for him. Instead he sat down next to Barnaby's chair and waited patiently for him to arrive and give him, what he considered, a real breakfast.

But the DCI seemed to have an argument with his sergeant. Something case- related, naturally.

Finally, FINALLY! Barnaby just started to ignore Jones' accusations and concentrated on the dog.

Sykes got a huge piece of bacon, which made him really happy.

Then it was time for his morning walk. He wagged his tail and followed Barnaby happily to the backdoor.

The man opened the door and gestured outside: "Help yourself, Sykesi. But be quite quick, please. We have to go back to the station. I have the feeling that we are so close to solving the case.", and more quietly he added: "Maybe do it in the neighbours' garden. Those who had played this annoying music on Tuesday evening."

"Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?", Jones asked. The Sergeant was now standing behind him, his arms crossed.

"That's none of your business.", Barnaby said flatly.

"Do you really think, that the dog is that smart, that he understands you?"

Before Barnaby could answer, Sykes felt that he had no other choice, than to do, as he was asked.

They watched him

"Good boy.", Barnaby said.

Jones said nothing.

"Now come inside and wait until we come back.", the DCI said.

 _But I need to show you something important._

The dog barked.

"Yes, I am going to miss you too.", Barnaby said softly.

If he was physically capable of doing so, he would now roll his eyes.

But Jones was able to do so. And he did.

Then the detectives left.

What use was it, being a really smart dog, if your master wasn't?

~~~M~~~

"Wake up, honey. The day has come."

Elyas opened the curtains of Audrey's bedroom.

Audrey made a noise that sounded a bit like a sick horse.

When he didn't get more as answer, Elyas opened the windows.

After some unfriendly discussions, Audrey agreed to get up, because it was time for breakfast and she was hungry.

When they finally entered the kitchen, Peggy already sat on the table. She suddenly looked very old.

"I. Don't want no more- I don't want…", she stuttered.

Elyas ran a hand through her hair very softly. "I know."

More cheerfully he added: "Let's have some typical English breakfast and then we will see where this day might bring us."

"Nooo." She covered her face with a pillow and mumbled something remotely unfriendly.

"Aud."

"Petra. It's just Petra. I'm so sick of all of this." She groaned loudly.

~~~M~~~

When Barnaby sat down, he noticed a pink envelope on his desk, which looked really out of place between the white documents and yellow folders. How Odd.

He opened it slowly, after he had observed it very carefully and put a glove on.

And in beautiful cursive letters, there was written: "It's time."

"I drive.", Jones said, who had looked over the DCIs shoulder, and snapped the car keys out of Barnabys hand.

But until they had reached the car he was once again in the possession of the car keys.

"I have a really bad feeling.", Jones said, when Barnaby drove much too fast down the road, they had used so often in the past weeks.

The DCI didn't answer.

~~~M~~~

When they reached the cottage, the front door was wide open.

The living room and kitchen were empty, so they stormed upstairs and down the floor, in the last bedroom, there were the McPherson siblings.

Elyas stood in front of the opened window.

His robe flapped dramatically in the wind.

Next to him stood his sisters.

Audrey held a gun to her head.

Peggy held a glass close to her lips.

"Stop this! -What are you doing?", Jones yelled, as the siblings smiled creepily.

"I knew you would gonna come to me.", Elyas yelled and let his robe flap even more dramatically.

"You did leave a letter in the office.", Jones mumbled

"And here you are."

"Yeah and you can only save two of us.", Audrey said.

"But you better choose carefully.", Elyas said.

"You are not just going to kill yourselves. Are you?", Barnaby yelled.

Jones wondered if he was the only one who realised, that his voice was actually shaking.

"I'm capable of anything.", Elyas yelled.

" _WE_ are capable of anything.", Petra corrected him.

"And we are even filming it, for the world to see.", Peggy added and gestured towards the corner behind Barnaby and Jones, where a small black camera hung, just under the ceiling.

"All I can say is: Don't make me your enemy."

"What are you even doing here?", Barnaby asked.

"What are _you_ doing here?", Elyas asked back. Smiling insanely.

"You wanted us to come here."

"Of course I did, silly." He laughed insanely.

"So we are just ignoring the camera!?", Jones whispered.

The DCI just gave him a look and suddenly the Sergeant understood.

Seeing them stand next to each other showed how obviously they were siblings, having the same stubby noses and the same eyes and wearing long black robes. And with a bit too much dark Make-up.

After another dramatic pause, the siblings began to speak again.

"I, Phineas McPherson, confess-"

"I, Petra McPherson, confess-"

"And I, Peggy McPherson, confess-"

And together: "THE MURDERS OF CLAUDIA MORSTAN AND JEFFREY GARDNER."

"Why did you do it? How?", Jones asked.

"I pushed Claudia, so the poor thing fell over.", Phineas said.

"I leaned against Claudia and that clumsy bitch fell over her own feet.", Petra said.

"I ran very quickly and knocked her over.", Peggy said.

"Yeah, very funny. You guys are protecting each other.", Jones yelled.

"As for Jeffrey-", Elyas began.

"Oh, don't even bother. You are wasting our time.", Jones hissed.

"Why?", Barnaby simply asked.

"I wanted to become famous. And with the money I wanted people to find a better cure for cancer.", Elyas said.

"For once in my damn life I wanted people to talk about me, to recognize me, to see, that I am an important member of society and everyone is leaving me and I don't want Peggy to leave me alone and-" Petra stopped and looked surprised about her unexpected outburst of emotions. Then she mumbled: "Whatevs."

"You see, I don't have much time left and I wanted to have a bit of fun.", Peggy said.

"So you basically did all of this to help your sister.", Barnaby stated.

"But why kill them?", Jones asked.

"Because nothing else would have sold that good. And whose fault is it? Society! They only want to read the macabre stuff I had no other choice, I'm afraid.", Phineas said.

Petra opened her mouth to add something, but got interrupted by Jones, who said: "You always have a choice."

"Well-"

But Barnaby had heard enough and said loudly: "I'm sorry, but we have to arrest you-"

"Then we are sorry, too.", Elyas said loudly.

"No! What the hell are you doing?", Jones yelled.

"We'll corrupt your statistics."

The gun made this terrible clicking sound, while Peggys lips touched the rim of the glass and Elyas sat down on the frame of the open window behind him.

"3"

"You don't have to do that.", Jones said and stepped forward.

"Yes, we do."

"You might only be able to save two of us. The third one will be gone."

"Why are you doing this?"

"For fame." and he gestured towards the other end of the room, where a camera had been put.

"This video will be used as evidence. No one of your fans is ever going to see this."

"Don't worry, honey. It's livestream."

"But-"

"2"

"We do this for ourselves. We want to be remembered. We have no one but us. We killed because of anger, hurt and love."

"You have a strange definition of love.", Jones said and inconspicuously moved forward.

Barnaby did the same thing.

"If you love someone, other things don't matter that much anymore. There is that one person, which means the world to you. You don't see flaws. You don't want to change a single thing.", Peggy said.

"If you love someone, the thought of him makes you smile. You look forward to every time you get to see him again and miss him, when he is not with you. But when you are with him, the colours are brighter, the weight on your shoulder lifts and-", he started to giggle, "there are butterflies in your tummy.", Phineas said.

"You can only love someone, when you can love yourself. Sometimes there isn't any love. Sometimes all there is, is hate.", Petra said.

"So you took revenge out of self-pity?", Barnaby asked gravely.

"Did it do you any good? Why couldn't you just go on and make the best out of your lifes?", Jones asked.

"It's not that easy.", Elyas said. He straitened his robe absently.

"It's never that easy.", Audrey said. She cleaned an invisible spot on the gun with her sleeve.

"It's complicated, because now we have no way to go back.", Peggy said. She stared at the almost shimmering fluid in her glass, which oscillated lightly because of her slightly shaking hands.

"But that's enough philosophy for today.", Elyas said.

"Ok. Girls, time's up.", Peggy said loudly.

"1"

Then time seemed to shatter.

Jones jumped forward and could get to hold back Petra, who was closest to him just before she could move too far. He threw her gun to the other side of the room.

Barnaby could reach Peggy, before it was too late for her. The fluid spilled over both of them and the glass shattered on the wooden floor.

Both girls fought them. There was a lot of screaming and scratching, since both girls were unexpectedly strong.

But this also meant that they couldn't get to Elyas in time.

"It was a pleasure to meet you, John. I see you on the other side, girls.", the young man said, head shaking. Then he shrugged, smiling at the camera for the last time. A second later, he was gone.

The sisters and Barnaby screamed. Time froze

The silence after that was even louder.

They climbed down the stairs as fast as they could, avoiding to look at each other or the side of the house, where Elyas had jumped down. They were shaking.

Barnaby stayed with the girls, while Jones went to see, if there was still anything, he could do.

Then he came back. "Sir, he is gone."

The girls started screaming again. Barnaby hid his face and Jones could practically feel his hurt.

The Sergeant gestured towards the house: "Not gone like in dead. He is not there. I assume he jumped onto the balcony and then fled."

"This son of a-", Audrey began.

"Don't say that about mom.", Peggy said weakly.

"Bastard.", Barnaby yelled. Then he covered his mouth in shock.

"Calm down. Remember what I said? Do you remember what I told you the whole time? Do you even-"

"Now is not the time for accusations, Jones, we can still get him."

Then there was the sound of a car arriving.

"Finally. Jenkins and Fredericks are coming."

The policemen jumped out of their car.

"Gentlemen, please take over. We can still get him.", Barnaby yelled.

The officers handcuffed Peggy and Petra, while the Detective Chief Inspector and his Sergeant started to run in the direction of the forest, guessing, where Elyas might have gone.

Jones felt like they ran in circles for hours even though it couldn't have been more than went minutes.

But there was nothing. No hint of anyone going there. They listened to the dead branches cracking underneath their steps and kept walking until they met an older lady carrying a cat around. Of course they interrogated her, but she hadn't seen anything.

When they got back to the cottage, the police car was gone, as well as Fredericks, Audrey and Peggy.

That wouldn't have been a problem, but suddenly they spotted that on the ground, close to a tree laid Jenkins with a head injury.

"Call an ambulance!", Barnaby told Jones.

"It hurts so much.", Jenkins groaned.

"What happened? Who did this?", Barnaby asked and knelt down next to him, observing the injury.

"Fredericks. Because that little bitch told him so. The brownhaired one. Stupid manipulative-"

"Audrey. ... I mean Petra, I mean- ", Barnaby said.

"Damn it."

"I can't believe they are getting away with it.", Jones yelled at no one in particular.

"They aren't. You call the airport, I call the station. And for back up. They are not getting away with it!"

They reached into their pockets.

Then they froze.

"Sir, I can't find it, I think I lost my phone."

"Mine is gone too."

"That brats stole them. They took mine too.", Jenkins yelled. His voice cracked.

Then he said a few things more. And they weren't very nice.

Barnaby said unusually loudly: "They planned this. They…"

A few birds, who had sat on a tree close by, got scared and flew away.

Jones had never heard him curse like this before.

~~~M~~~

When they all had calmed down a bit, they walked over to the closest house, where the old cat lady from before allowed them to make some important phone calls.

Jenkins got brought to the next hospital and the detectives went back to the car. Barnaby sat in the drivers' seat, but not knowing what to do next, he hadn't started the car yet.

How could this happen? All of this? How? He still was in a bit of a shock, from which he recovered only slowly.

"Sir? I think … Maybe their biggest fan knows, where they are.", Jones said after a while, although he really didn't wanted to pay a visit to Vanessa.

"It is worth a try.", Barnaby said after a pause.

After a half angry and half silent car ride, they came close to her house and it was again immediately apparent, that something wasn't right. The open door was like a huge sign, that there probably had something terrible happened. So they ran inside.

When they entered the kitchen, they saw Vanessa.

Someone had smashed her face with the door of the fridge.

She was surrounded by snippets of photos and articles, posters and magazines, most of them showing rather familiar faces and places.

Jones had to suppress the urge to just kick something, while Barnaby knelt down next to her and observed the colourful mess on the floor.

Again they had to use the landline to call for help.

"It looks like her watch stopped at the moment, when she was killed.", Barnaby said, when he had another look at the corpse, while still being careful not to touch her.

"If her watch stopped at the exact moment she was killed, then they have an alibi.", he added.

"Because they were with us?"

"Yes and the video will prove it."

"Thanks for reminding me that our failing got captured for eternity.", Jones mumbled.

"If you keep behaving like this, you can wait in the car, Jones."

He ignored the last remark and wondered around in the living room instead.

"But then who killed Vanessa?", he asked after a while. He really hoped, that pathology would arrive soon. But they were still busy at a hostage taking, that had escalated very badly in Bow Clayton.

"Maybe they changed her watch. I think we seen this before. Maybe even on TV."

"Is there any other evidence, that the murder happened at exactly this time?"

He walked over to the living room table. "Look at her laptop. She has a few tabs open. One shows an article about climate change, a makeuptutorial, a cat video, a…"

Barnaby was now leaning over his shoulder: "Wait, go back."

"Where?"

"Look, the makeuptutorial was live stream. And look at the time of the video. She had paused it four minutes, before the time her watch stopped. It is very unlikely, that they stopped here before-"

"Lucky us, she wasn't wearing her smartwatch over there."

"Why wasn't she wearing a smartwatch? Maybe they put it on her."

"Because the battery died. Look, it's not working."

"But still. Maybe they changed the battery."

"If we are arguing like that, we can also assume that she could have broken the watch before she let the murderers in."

"Why are you talking in Plural?"

And they kept arguing for two more hours until pathology arrived, without coming to a satisfying conclusion.

Also it wasn't easy to tell an exact time of death anymore after so much time had passed. Only the cause still seemed pretty clear.

~~~M~~~

After a very long day, Barnaby and Jones came home, still being in a foul mood. But they had dinner together anyway. While eating, Jones pretended to study a newspaper from two days ago, while Barnaby had a discussion with Sykes.

And after the Sergeant had finished eating, he went to watch some TV, while the DCI did the dishes.

Jones wasn't even paying attention to the baking-program on TV. The sound of Barnaby washing the dishes quite aggressively distracted him, which made him sigh loudly.

Over the past weeks, if not months, it somehow had become a habit of them, to stay over at each other's houses.

They never talked about it, had somehow just silently agreed, that it was easier that way.

But now Jones mused, if it would be better to leave Barnaby alone, for at least a while, to sort things out for himself.

But then the DCI entered the living room again, sat down comfortably close next to his sergeant on the sofa and changed the channel to an old horror movie. And Jones fell asleep, before the first werewolf transformed in the moons' silvery light.

~~~M~~~

Barnaby had a sleepless night, thinking about all sorts of things.

At approximately five o'clock in the morning, he found, that it was no use trying anymore, so he got up to prepare breakfast, since he found nothing else to distract himself.

Ten minutes after he had started making coffee, Jones silently entered the kitchen and sat down on the table. So Barnaby made a second cup and gave it to him. Then he started to rummage through the cupboards, while Jones just stared at the opposite wall.

When side glancing at the dog, Barnaby suddenly noticed, that Sykes looked at him somehow strangely.

"Do you miss Sarah, Sykesi?", the DCI asked carefully.

The dog tilted his head and looked back at him with huge brown eyes.

"Well I certainly don't. I think." Barnaby stared in the distance for a moment.

The dog sat down and seemed to wait patiently for something.

Since he couldn't figure it out, he asked: "What do you want to tell me, Sykesi?"

The dog barked, then ran away and quickly came back with his leash in his mouth.

"Would you like to go for a walk?", Barnaby asked and took the leash.

"Let me just go for a walk with him, so you can prepare our meal in peace, Sir.", Jones said, who suddenly had the urge to escape.

"Ok, but don't be late. –Wait, no. I'll come with you.", Barnaby said and put the eggs back into the fridge.

~~~M~~~

They walked for a long time, enjoying the fresh air of the morning, both very quiet, because neither of them wanted to start fighting again. So they just kept wondering aimlessly.

Slowly the sun started to rise. Every now and then, Sykes started to act strangely. He sat down and looked in a particular direction, but Barnaby picked him up from the ground every time and carried him for a bit. Maybe the dog became old and got more quickly exhausted, Barnaby thought.

Suddenly they all stopped. "You look like you've seen a ghost again, Jones. Or maybe a werewolf?"

"Sir, do you see this woman over there?"

"Where?"

"She looks so familiar. Like Ms Morstan …Claudia…"

Before Barnaby could add anything, Jones already ran towards the woman. So the DCI followed him.

"Excuse me.", he said and then the woman started running.

"STOP POLICE!", he yelled.

The woman ran through streets and narrow lanes, knocking over pedestrians, boxes and bicycles.

When they finally cornered her, they saw, that she was actually much older than Claudia.

Just as they wanted to apologize, the woman began crying: "I'm so sorry."

"You-"

"Someone had to make them pay. Anyone. You have to understand. Please!"

Her eyes had an unhealthy colour and her red hair was a mess. She cleaned her nose loudly.

The detectives waited for her to continue.

She took a deep breath and said: "I'm so sorry. I-I don't know, how this could have happened. I promise I am usually not like this."

The woman cleaned her nose once more and cleared her throat in between sobs.

"My poor little Claudia. She was so young. Those awful children."

She coughed.

"I promise, I will pay for this window."

Jones gaped at her.

But Barnaby stepped closer and said: "It's fine, Mrs Morstan. It's not necessary, that you pay for that broken window. Just please don't throw rocks through windows again, because people could get seriously get injured."

She nodded and wiped away a tear.

"You should go home, now, Mrs Morstan. And we are very sorry for your loss."

"Thank you.", she muttered with a hint of relieve.

They waited for her to enter a cab, safely.

When the woman had disappeared, they shared a look and sighed in unison.

~~~M~~~

After that incident days passed, with nothing much of importance happening.

"I can see you losing your sanity.", Jones suddenly said on one quiet evening, when they were watching something incredibly stupid on TV, and didn't pay much attention anyway.

Barnaby didn't answer.

"Let it go for your own sake.", the sergeant said softly, "We will catch them sooner or later. Just try not to think about it for a bit, will you?"

For a moment silence hung between them like a dark cloud. Ominous but intangible.

"You are right.", Barnaby finally said flatly. And Jones knew, that he was lying.

He picked up Sykes from his lap, stood up and started to carry him around the rooms aimlessly.

Jones watched him worriedly, as he muttered something remotely unrecognizable even more to himself, than to Sykes.

~~~M~~~

Even months after the events at the McPherson cottage, Barnaby had a feeling that someone was following him around.

Someone was stalking him.

Not someone.

Elyas.

...Or Phineas.

It made him turn at every moving shadow, but never caught sight of anything out of the ordinary.

He didn't catch him and this feeling left him restless. Sleepless. Angry.

With fury, he read every single new Blogpost, and every word he read pushed him closer to insanity. It was impossible to find out, from where Elyas was posting them. The young man wrote about recipes, movies and music, despite his usual habit of shooting photos himself, he now only used stock photos.

Jones wanted to comfort the DCI very badly, but he couldn't figure out how.

They had one fight or two over literally nothing.

More time passed.

Murders happened. Cases were closed.

But then, one day on a dusty evening, Sykes could free himself from the leash, when Barnaby wasn't paying enough attention.

The dog started running as fast as he could (Every now and then he had to stop and wait for Barnaby and Jones to catch up with him).

Then Sykes reached the abandoned field, where there were still rests of the burnt tree visible, although it wasn't much after such a long time. The dog ran around the tree and barked wildly, so the detectives couldn't catch him, until Sykes ran between the sergeants' legs, which made him stumble and fall face flat on the ground.

"Look, Sir, I found something. There are teeth, I think, and, oh, my god-"

"Well done! You are a great detective. I should definitely promote you."

Jones blushed. "Well, Sir, I- Oh you are talking to the dog again." His shoulders sank.

Barnaby had picked up the dog and now gave him a little kiss on the head.

"And where is my reward?", Jones asked, as he stood up and tried to clean the dirt off his trousers with a tissue.

Against his expectations Barnaby leaned forward, grabbed his face and gave him a quick kiss on the forehead as well.

"Do you know, what this means? This is what Sykes wanted to tell us all along! This is why he acted so strangely! Do you remember when he started this behaviour?"

Jones was too flabbergasted to think straight, but Barnaby wasn't waiting for an answer.

"He wanted to show us this, since Walter Falk went missing! I bet this is Walter Falk!"

Jones didn't understand, how this would help with the case, but he was glad, to see the DCI being really excited.

They found Walter Falk!

Actually it was Sykes, who found Walter Falk, which Barnaby later had to clarify if not emphasize in the report.

And Sykes did get a huge treat that day.

~~~M~~

One rainy morning, about three weeks later, things started to get interesting again, when Jenkins suddenly yelled loud enough for the whole station to hear: "Sir, the surveillance system at the airport has actually worked. Look who we got here."

And he ran across the room, with a tablet grasped firmly in his hands

There was a huge round of applause.

"Sir, the colleagues caught Ms McPherson and Fred at the Manchester airport! They had tickets booked to Cracow, Poland! They just phoned us!", he said, a bit out of breath.

Before Jones or Barnaby could answer anything, he excitedly gestured towards the door and added: "They are being held there. Let's go. What are you waiting for?"

It was a long drive, and at every traffic light and every pedestrian cross, Jenkins cursed very colourful, while the Sergeant and the DCI sat in silence and anticipation, contemplating their next moves.

"Just give me five minutes with them.", Jenkins said, as soon as they got out of the car and already rolled up his sleeves.

~~~M~~~

When they entered the interrogation room at the airport, where Audrey and Fredericks were held, they were greeted by two people in fluffy jackets, with sunglasses and colourful hats. It became apparent, that they got in a fight with the security team, because they refused, to get checked properly.

Barnaby and Jones exchanged a look.

Jenkins followed them inside the room, looking very intimidating. Jones sent him out again.

"Where are your sister and brother?", Barnaby asked coldly.

"Dead and gone.", Audrey said, her face stone.

"Did you kill them?", Jones asked, when he saw, that Barnaby wasn't moving.

"No! Peggy died because of her Cancer in Finchmere. She is buried there under a false name. And Elyas has disappeared ever since -like in 'he just went somewhere else and I don't know where. Only my fiancé stayed with me."

She held Fredericks' hand.

He smiled absently, despite their awful situation.

"Where is Elyas?", Barnaby asked.

"I confess that I killed all of my friends. -I wasn't really friends with Claudia though. Stupid slut. Anyway, I can write down how I've done it-"

"I will wait for you until you come out of prison, sweety.", Fredericks whispered.

"Where is Elyas?", Jones asked.

"Give me a pen and paper and we are finished in no time with my confession and-"

"Where. Is. Elyas?", Barnaby asked.

"How should she know?!", Jenkins said furiously and held her hand more protectively.

A smile flickered across her face. Then she shook her head and shrugged. "I don't know. -But, if he's still that damn stubborn idiot I grew up with, he's still after you."

Silence.

"I knew it!", Barnaby and Jones said in unison.

When the detectives and the policeman left the room, a mischievous smile crept across Audrey's face.

~~~M~~~

"I have done so much more for them, than they have ever given me credit for.", Audrey said silently when they were sure, that they were alone.

"Is it really what you want?", Fredericks asked behind her.

She turned around and kissed his lips softly, her hands rested on his chest, as she closed her eyes. "Do it.", she answered firmly.

And he pulled the trigger.

And he pulled the trigger again.

"Sorry. I forgot to load it."

Audrey looked at him. Then she started to laugh.

"We have come that far and they didn't get it and now you tell me you forgo to load it? I hate my life."

She couldn't stop laughing. Not even, when sitting in the police car. Fredericks just quietly held her hand. And from time to time he worriedly stroke her arm.

~~~M~~~

Barnaby decided to make them wait a bit, experience, how it was to sleep in a cell and sent them to the most uncomfortable one.

With nothing else left to do at the moment, Barnaby and Jones went home.

While the DCI made dinner, the sergeant went for a walk with Sykes.

"Are you stalking me?", suddenly a voice yelled from behind him.

He jumped and his heart skipped a beat. But then he saw, that it was only Jessica, who scared him. She wore an aggressively yellow sports suit, but didn't look like she'd been running for a long time. Her hair still looked perfect, also her makeup was still intact.

Before he could ask her the same thing, she continued: "Why didn't you call me back?"

Jones really didn't want to answer that and kept quiet, crossing his arms.

So she laughed it off and changed her tactic.

"What's that dog's name?"

"Sykes.", Jones mumbled.

"Cool. Which breed?" She threw her hair back. It smelled like strawberries.

Jones answered reluctantly, as he ran a hand through his hair: "He's some kind of terrier, I think. Actually it is John's dog."

Jessica smiled insincerely. "…And while the chief inspector has more important stuff to do, you are walking his dog and playing the helpful boyfriend."

"Yes. I MEAN NO!"

She laughed.

"I thought, you were going to say 'Sergeant'."

"I didn't." She winked.

Jones searched for words and finally he said: "I wondered-"

But then she suddenly started jogging again and Jones couldn't follow her, because Sykes had just done what was expected from a dog on his evening walk and Jones had to pick it up, because an old man was watching him, first and then Jessica was gone.

~~~M~~~

They brought her to the interrogation room.

"Petra, tell me where your brother is, or-"

"You know what? I'm telling you. Instead of being a good brother and helping me get out of here, he did- he did shit –he did nothing at all. I'm trading Fred's and my freedom for my brother. And Fred will say, that he was with me, when Jeffrey died."

She smiled shortly.

"Ever noticed all the empty houses in midsomer?", she asked.

"Yes, there were a few murders in the past few years, and there aren't many people who want to live in a house, where murders happened.", Jones said slowly.

"One of those would be a great place to hide, don't you think?"

"Could you be more precise? There are a lot of empty houses in midsomer."

"He's literally in the house next to yours', damnit. Have you never noticed?"

They went white. "Oh."

Before he left the room, Barnaby turned around once more Columbo-style: "One last thing: Tell me about Bill."

"Who is Bill?", Fredericks asked in confusion.

"No one actually.", she muttered.

But then her fiancés' concerned look made her smile.

"Ok. Bill was Elyas' Ex. They were amazing together."

"Why did you want them to get together so badly?", Jones asked.

"Because I wanted him to be happy. You've seen Elyas when he is single. –All whiny and depressed and …he easily gets obsessed with things… I kind of wanted to help him."

~~~M~~~

Soon after that Jones and Barnaby stood in front of the only seemingly empty house.

"Would you wait outside, please, Jones?"

"Sir?"

"Let me talk alone to him."

"If I don't come back, you have to take care of Sykes.", he said with almost half a smile.

Still not completely convinced, Jones stayed outside, but ready to follow him inside if the smallest hint of trouble appeared.

So Barnaby stepped inside the house with his bravest expression and locked his eyes with his sergeant for the last time, before he closed the door.

The first thing he noticed, was that the house smelled like candles, cold pizza and some flowery-sweet perfume.

"Elyas? I know that you are here!"

"I'm in the kitchen.", came a cheerful voice from somewhere in the back.

"Elyas."

"I made dinner. Please, do have a seat."

Barnaby sat down reluctantly as Elyas arranged to plates of spaghetti.

"How did you know, that I would come here today?"

"I didn't."

"How did you come here anyway?"

"Honey, I rose up from the dead. I do it all the time."

Barnaby stared at the plate in front of him, like it was its fault.

"How was your day, John?"

Moments went by and then Barnaby decided to play along.

"We caught your sister and her fiancé at the manchester airport."

"Seriously? Did she stay with the old guy?"

"Fredericks is barely older than me."

"He looks older… Aren't you gonna eat something?"

Reluctantly Barnaby put a spoonful in his mouth. It almost made him choke, because it tasted like cardboard with ketchup.

"I wanna let go the pain I felt so long. I want to be somewhere I belong. And I belong to you, John."

"I know, that Audrey didn't kill Walter Falk, Claudia Morstan, Jeffrey Gardner or Vanessa D'onoffrio."

"I know. He is just not right for you. You should live with me here instead, John."

Barnaby did his best to ignore Elyas and said: "She doesn't have strong enough motives and she is her own worst enemy. She won't hurt anyone but herself. Plus she didn't know, that Vanessa and Walter died, and I'm convinced, that all of the murders are connected to each other. But I can't see the bigger picture just yet. Jones thinks-"

"You can tell me if I'm off but I see it in your face, when you say that he is the one that you want-"

He continued to ignore the longing looks.

"Of course you could have done it together, but I don't think your communication is very good, Phineas.", Barnaby said and stood up, pretending, that he wanted to leave.

"'Phineas' is my dead name. We could run away together, John. Somewhere where it doesn't rain. I know I can treat you better than he can.", Elyas said and jumped up as well.

"I see, that you are trying to protect each other. But you have to understand, that it isn't the right thing to do. You have to help me find the killer.", the DCI said more softly.

"I'll stop time for you. The second you say you like me to.", Elyas said and stepped closer.

"It won't help anyone, if neither of you killed them. Do you want to go to prison for a crime you didn't commit?", Barnaby said and tried to keep his personal space.

"Would you visit me, John?", Elyas reached for him and Barnaby found himself pressed against the doorframe.

Their faces were so close, they almost touched.

"I did it.", Elyas whispered.

Barnaby waited calmly for him to continue.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I killed all of them.", the young man said and looked away dramatically, which gave Barnaby the opportunity to slip past him back to the middle of the kitchen, where it was possible to breathe again.

"How did you do it, Phineas?", he asked.

Phineas shook his head.

"You are going to leave Ben, Sykes and me alone."

"You are not going to get rid of me, John. I'll be the actor starring in your bad dreams."

"You know something about the murders, you aren't telling me."

"I want something in return."

"No.", Barnaby said before thinking.

His expression suddenly changed completely. "Look, what you made me do."

Surprisingly fast, he was at the kitchen counter.

"You don't have to- Phineas, listen, everything will be fine."

"What if I can't go on without you?"

He stared in the DCIs eyes intensely, as he slowly cut his left wrist.

And a second later he was on the floor.

"JONES!", Barnaby yelled accusingly.

"I only saw, that he had a knife and thought, that you were in danger.", Jones said, as he calmly put the pan back on the cupboard.

"Call an ambulance! I can't believe, you just hit him with a pan."

"I wanted to do that since I first saw him. …He'll be fine. Look, he didn't even cut himself very deeply."

"I told you to stay outside! Everything was completely under my control at all times."

"That's why he was cutting his wrists, when I came into the kitchen."

"I thought, you thought I were in danger."

"…So him playing with a knife was part of your plan?"

~~~M~~~

Elyas was brought to the hospital and after that had to stay there for at least three weeks.

Much to Jones' annoyance, Barnaby went to visit him every week for two hours.

"How did you kill your friends?", Barnaby asked every time he visited.

And every time Elyas told a more confusing and more absurd story.

When Barnaby came back home after his last visit to Elyas, before the young man was well enough to leave the hospital, Jones asked him: "And how did he do it?"

"He didn't."

"He didn't?"

"No, Jones he didn't. He doesn't know the details about the murders. He really wants to make me believe that he committed the murders but he can't convince me. We are back at the start."

Jones sighed helplessly.

~~~M~~~

In the middle of the next night, Barnaby suddenly stormed into the living room, where Jones had been sleeping on the couch. "I know who killed Walter Falk.", he exclaimed.

"Grace?", Jones asked, who felt like he had almost gotten a heart attack.

"How did you know?", Barnaby asked in confusion.

Jones shrugged and smiled sheepishly. "She is the only one left."

"This will sound great in court."

"Why do you think, that she did it?"

"Because she ran away, she was the most flustered and hysterical-"

"All of them are hysterical."

"I just wondered, what if we shouldn't start with Walter."

"You think that there is a serial killer?"

"No, I mean that we should start at the end instead of the beginning."

The sergeant didn't look like he was understanding what the DCI was trying to explain, but like he was slowly falling back to sleep.

So Barnaby started to pace up and down in front of the sofa.

"What if we start with Vanessa and move in the opposite direction? Let's assume Grace killed Vanessa, because she knew who Grace killed. Maybe Vanessa knew about the murder of Jeffrey Gardner and Claudia Morstan, but they got killed, because they knew about Walter Falk. And-"

Jones let his head sink back into the still warm pillow.

" ... But where is she?", Jones mumbled.

"If only I knew.", Barnaby said and sat down next to Jones on the sofa.

The sergeant sighed as it appeared to him, that he wouldn't get any more sleep that night.

~~~M~~~

Weeks passed.

"Ben?", Barnaby suddenly yelled from the kitchen on one quiet Saturday afternoon.

"What is it?", Jones yelled back from the living room, where he was just about to use the vacuum cleaner.

Barnaby entered the room and held a small piece of paper in his hand, accusingly: "I was doing the laundry and I found this in your trousers. This clearly is a womans' handwriting. Would you care to explain this?"

Jones wanted to look at this piece of paper, but Barnaby held it out of his reach.

"Look, this is Peggys number. She got the last box of cornflakes and for exchange she gave me her number. I didn't ask for it.

...wow, I didn't have this trousers washed in quite a long time. Have I?"

"I'll call that number."

"Why? She is dead. -Do you not believe me!?"

But Barnaby had already his phone and typed in the number and put it on speaker.

It beeped for a long time before someone took the call.

"I told you not to call me, Phineas. You should talk to mom by the way. Dad went back to Egypt, so I have to help mom with the food, or she'll burn the house down. I have to go now, keep the fire extinguisher close. Grace is also waiting. See you on Thanksgiving.", a husky womans' voice whispered.

Beeb. Beeb. Beeb.

"She is alive?", Jones stated.

"We have to find her. She might be in danger."

"You think, that Grace might be after her as well? Why?"

"Maybe she is after all possible witnesses. She could think for example, that Vanessa told her something… Jones, you know, how murders are. She probably already killed four people. We have to find Peggy first."

"It sounds like she is with her mother.", Jones said thoughtfully.

As fast as they could, they logged in to the computer and started to search for Peggy McPherson.

"I can't find a Pamela McPherson."

"Try Pamela Parkinson., Jones said"

A few clicks, and then-

"Got it."

"I'm driving.", Jones said.

"No, I'm driving.", Barnaby said and snapped the keys out of the sergeants' hand.

"Please don't.", Jones groaned quietly.

"Did you say something, Jones?"

"No, Sir. …Just… Are you sure?"

"I'm fine, I promise.", Barnaby said firmly.

~~~M~~~

It felt like they were driving forever until, the GPS told them, that they had arrived at their destination.

They quickly got out of the car and walked around the house

At first it didn't seem, like someone was there.

But then, suddenly, Barnaby saw a shadow.

"IS THERE ANYONE?", Jones yelled.

They heard a muffled scream, and started to run in the direction, where it came from.

Jones kicked in the backdoor and they stormed inside the house, where they found Grace, who stood in the middle of the kitchen, frozen in her movement.

The ban was broken, when there was another muffled scream from somewhere in the background.

First it seemed, like Grace wanted to try to run away, but then she reached quickly for a knife on the kitchen counter and decided to attack.

The three of them were separated by the round kitchen table.

Before Barnaby could use his psychology degree to say something comforting and to deescalate the situation, she threw the knife in Jones direction. But she wasn't very accurate and he could duck in the very last moment.

And before he could catch another thought, Barnaby knocked over the table, which was only half on purpose, but it hit Grace, before she could reach for another knife.

Together they managed to handcuff her.

Again they heard another muffled sound from somewhere downstairs.

They followed the sound and finally found Peggy and Mrs Parkinson.

"I solved the murders!", Peggy said cheerfully, when she caught her breath again.

"Walter was killed by Claud, Jeffrey killed Claud and then Grace killed Jeffrey and Vanessa. I know that, because, Vanessa told me, well not about her own death, but you know about everything. And thank god you guys called me and with that got my secret message."

Jones looked to Barnaby.

"I knew that.", Barnaby said and crossed his arms.

"I know, that you know." Jones smiled, "It's over now."

~~~M~~~

The case was finally closed and Jones felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. Like a shadow that had hung above them for a long time had disappeared.

"First she beats cancer than she gets held captive by a psychopath. Can you believe it?", Jones said, as they strolled through the streets going nowhere in particular.

"We've met people who had less luck.", Barnaby said dryly.

"There had been a lot of miscommunication.

So Claudia killed Walter, Jeffrey killed Claudia, then Grace killed Jeffrey and Vanessa.

And after everything that has happened, all Elyas gets is a restraining order?"

"Are you implying, that you want to frame me for murder!?", a voice from somewhere behind some bushes yelled.

Jones jumped, but Barnaby only crossed his arms and smiled mildly.

"Yes, Sergeant Jones, what are you implying?"

"Sir, let's drive to Fletcher's cross, where that gruesome murder had happened, in forty-two Lilac-lane.", Jones said loudly.

And very quietly he added: "What would you like for dinner, Sir?"

"We could go to our new favourite pub.", he said with a smirk.

"They closed the 'pink feathers'."

"Really?"

"But there is a new pub. 'The monochrome rainbow.'"

 _The End_

 **AUTHOR'S NOTE:**

I sincerely hope you enjoyed this.

Let me know, if you found any Easter eggs. ;)

It was the second part of the 'and the body count keeps rising'-series.

And good news: I am already working on the third part. But it will take some more time, because I have to finish one or two other projects first. And I also try to write some original content, which is quite exciting for me.

My search history is really messed up and I feel like I am probably on a no fly list because of my google-skills, so I hope this fic was at least a bit accurate. I shouldn't have googled 'how to kill someone with a toaster'. I know that now.

My favourite part was writing from Sykes' perspective.

Don't forget, that you can follow me on Tumblr, if you like to. Don't be shy, send a message, if you like to.

Some questions stayed open, but they will get answered eventually.

What happened to Sarah? What is Jessica's secret? And most importantly: What is Barnaby hiding from Jones?

Don't worry, you will find out.

There'll be a third and probably last part of the series, I have already written like 5/12 of it.

Well, good things come in threes, don't they?

Again: Thank you so much. I appreciate every single kudos, comment and view.

Stay tuned.

Love you,

Sam 3


	14. Bonus chapter

**_Author's note_**

I had intended to post this much earlier, but real life has been a bitch to me.

Like a really mean bitch.

Don't even ask me about it. :(

Days came and went. They were as happy, as they could be. Despite all the horrifying murders happening now and then all across midsomer. But to be fair: they would be unemployed, if there weren't these horrible people living in midsomer.

Anyway: one crispy morning, when Jones went to get the newspaper, he found a small cardboardbox next to the entrance.

A normal brown cardboard box with a red ribbon.

First he observed it very carefully, but there wasn't anything odd about it except for its sheer excistence. Then he decided to just pick it up and take it inside.

When he entered the kitchen, Barnaby was cooking something, that smelled truly beautiful of bacon and eggs and Sykes was of course watching him carefully from as close as he was allowed to come.

The sergeant tried not to be offended, when Barnaby bowed down to feed the dog the best piece of bacon.

He cleared his throat loudly which made the DI jump lightly.

"Look at that. Our names are written on it.", Jones began and showed him the box.

"Put it down. It might be a bomb. Carefully!", Barnaby exclaimed, almost dropping the pan.

But there was an unexplainable curiosity, that made the sergeant keep the box in his hands, grasping it tightly.

"Let the dog decide what it is first.", he said, when his eyes had wandered off to Sykes who had now finished his bacon.

Before Barnaby could say something, Jones held the box under the dogs' nose.

Sykes looked at the sergeant with big brown eyes, then at the box, then at the sergeant again.

"What is inside the box, Sykesy?", Barnaby asked.

"I bet it's a book.", Jones said, trying to hold the small box as steady as possible.

"I didn't ask you.", Barnaby said with a hint of exhaustion, "Of course it is a book. Look at the form and weight of the box."

Sykes took a closer look, sniffed a bit, but he didn't seem to notice anything out of the ordinary.

"Is he trained to know, if there is anything harmful inside there, Sir?", Jones asked reluctantly.

"He is a very smart dog.", Barnaby said stubbornly.

"Should we open it, then?"

"It's too small for being a bloody body part. Right?"

None of them moved, until the sergeant took a deep breath and said: "I'll open it now!"

He removed the ribbon as carefully as possible and then opened the box with the help of a kitchen knife, cutting through thin tape. Barnaby watched every move of the procedure.

He held a book with a somehow soft black cover, with nothing but the title on it.

The Dictionary of friendship. -Or how much did I really know?

He opened it.

On the inside there were stripes in the colours of the rainbow.

 _For Ben and John. Thank you for saving my life. Now I only have two left._

The dedication was written by hand. And the small letters felt somehow familiar.

Jones ran a hand over the thin paper. Too slow to cut.

He turned the page.

The book had six chapters:

Walter

Claudia

Jeffrey

Vanessa

Grace

Phineas and Petra

Each chapter was longer than the other chapter.

There also were a few drawings and photos.

A photo of the dictionary, Walter got killed with.

A screenshot of the text message, that had threatened her into starting to walk, when the traffic lights went red.

A photo of the toaster, that had killed Jeffrey.

A screenshot of Vanessas Fan-pages.

A photo of Grace sitting in a police car.

Then photos of Elyas and Audrey.

As babys, in school, at partys.

And most recent photos of them. Elyas selling ice cream. And Audrey holding a small child with chrystal blue eyes and blond hair.

The siblings had tired smiles.

Photos of all of the friends together, when they still used to be friends.

If you could ever call them that.

At a time so long ago.

When things seemed fine.

But when you started to look closer, you could see, that their smiling wasn't honest.

Jones and Barnaby got the feeling, that things have been insincere for a long time.

They read a few paragraphs.

Apparently Phineas and Petra had to look for other jobs because their parents decided after they learned about the occurrences of Midsomer that they should learn some responsibilities.

The drawings were amazing.

Small figures that were abstract and at the same time so familiar.

So odd.

Their faces seemed so soft and melancholic.

On each right hand corner there was a name written in tiny letters.

Bill.

When Barnaby turned to page 42, a letter fell out.

It was written in the same tiny letters.

 _'Dear Sirs,_ _I just wanted to thank you for making things right._ _Thank you for saving Peggy._ _Thank you for believing me._ _-Sincerely yours,_ _William Stone'_

"Imagine how he must have felt, drawing pictures of his exboyfriend and his dead friends.", Barnaby.

"Not good?", Jones asked.

Barnaby took a deep breath mockingly: "No, Jones, not good."

The DS rolled his eyes at the mildly annoyed expression of the DCI.

There were protocolls of the times of the murders:

At the end of the book was a photo.

No, a postcard.

Peggy in front of the Eiffel tower.

With one of those strangely flat french hats.

On the back of it were a few words written, almost unreadable.

The ink was black. And there was a coffee stain. It even smelled a bit of coffee.

In smeered letters there was written:

 _'A tragedy. Or a comedy?_ _I don't know._ _And I don't care._ _We can't turn back time._ _We only can try to make the best of our lifes. Every day. And then again._ _And thank you for saving mine._ _\- Peggy'_

And they sat down on the couch to read it, while Sykes sprawled across both their laps.

 ** _Author's note_**

So i wrote a bonus chapter, because. The episodes sometimes end before you can see a happy end or something.

And I think Peggy and Bill deserved a happy end, don't you think?

Still working on the final part of the series (while at the same time working on two or three other projects)

Sorry, because I can't concentrate on only one thing.

But my november was shit. If I count every word I've written in every project I'm doing right now (which I did), I reached exactly 9745 words during this whole cursed month.

 _Edit:_ and december is not going any better.


End file.
